Like always, last year was also a mix of some good movies and some bad ones. Lets talk about the bad ones here.
Sex comedies like Kya Kool Hai Hum 3 and Mastizaade were horrible which was on expected lines. Biopic on Azhar was terribly one-dimensional, while Baar Baar Dekho that looked from trailer inspired from Hollywood's 'About Time' was a complete torture despite great chemistry between Sidharth and Katrina.
Then there was the star studded launch movie of Harshvardhan and Saiyami, 'Mirzya' that had some splendid cinematography and good SEL music but the screenplay was at snail's pace and bored you to death. Few other small films that I saw and found myself saying 'WTF is this' were Beimaan Love and Saat Uchakkey.
Lastly, there was the so called paisa vasool movie (not me, Kajol tweeted so), 'Shivaay' that had some eye catching action and good background music by Mithoon, but Ajay's direction was so trashy that you would out of no-where see him shouting at the leading lady in movie that includes a sequence where he literally forces her to have a child for him.
Now, these were the bad movies, but then there were movies that I had lots of expectations from, some from the very start and for others it started with their trailers that were appealing enough. And yet they turned out to be bad to average.
Here's my list of Top 5 most disappointing hindi films of 2016.
1. Fitoor
This movie had fantastic trailer, exceptional music from Amit Trivedi and all the dialogue promos talking of how good this movie is gonna be. Plus, it was a movie from 'Rock On' and 'Kai Po Che' fame director Abhishek Kapoor, and based on famous book 'Great Expectations' (that I am still to read and will surely do). And there's lot to admire for the visuals that are very artistic and full of poetry. Yet somehow, Fitoor turned out to be a complete show-off from outside and baseless without any emotions when you watch the story unfold in the film. Instead of feeling bad for Noor (played by Aditya Roy Kapur) in the movie, my sympathy rather went for Aditya who seemed to have put a very sincere effort in the role and the movie completely betrayed him. Even Tabu's act was for a change not worth appreciating who got some cheesy dialogue lines. Katrina did her part, looked smashingly beautiful, won't criticise her acting as the writing of her character at first place faltered. Also, there's Ajay Devgan in a forgetful special appearance/cameo. Fitoor should easily had been among top5 films of the year, but not to be.
2. Fan
When the 1st teaser came, I was highly skeptical that 'yeh acha ni hone wala'. It was the first theatrical trailer that suddenly made me think that Fan could well go into the very good movies done by Maneesh Sharma like Band Baaja Baaraat and Shudh Desi Romance. And while watching the film it was going so well till the interval. There was a fan Gaurav (played by Shahrukh Khan) who had all life worshipped this celeb Aaryan (played by Shahrukh Khan), and one incident where he gets to meet him by wrong doings makes him develop hatred for him. Now that makes for some watch if only the writing was on synch too which wasnt and thereby the 2nd half went totally downhill. Problem was the idea that Gaurav was all the time seeking a sorry from Aryan and there were no more layers added to his hatred, except for one hard-hitting scene where he enters Aryan's house and destroys his study room full of trophies venting out the anger stored all the time inside. With some other director, 2nd half would had worked because you would had known the plot would try to use slightly similar looking fan try to disguise as celeb. But I didn't expect Maneesh to follow this pattern, that defies logic as in 1st half at no point anyone compares Gaurav being Aryan, but in 2nd half everyone is easily fooled to suddenly think Gaurav is actually Aryan only. Shahrukh's performance was very good, specially when you consider that he did crap films like Chennai Express, Happy New Year and Dilwale before this. In comparison to them, Fan does look so good, plus it was a brave attempt to play a role that shows lot of how Shahrukh is infact in real too like the scene where he tells one of his assistant that if Gaurav is sanki then he isn't less either. Or the dark sides of being a celeb it explores like the scene where he looks at a empty hall where audience doesn't turn up for his performance. Unfortunately, if you are fond of Maneesh Sharma cinema, then you would have expected a perfect movie like I did.
3. Udta Punjab
Surprise! Surprise! Abhishek Chaubey had done both Ishqiya films before this, which made me believe he excels in dark cinema a lot, very much on Vishal Bharadwaj lines. Udta Punjab had the backdrop of how youth are wasting life with drugs, and its effect on 4 main characters, Shahid, Alia, Kareena and Diljit. Expectations were bound to come in, with Amit Trivedi's music once again helping in building it. And not to forget all the censorship drama the movie went through. When it arrived, I was surprised because it never was and still isnt a film that is bad, I still find it a very well made movie. But its not hard-hitting, and that's what I was expecting from it. Rather its more dramatic with minimal dark humor. Shahid's character was too disappointing, could had explored so much more to it, like the scene in jail where he is stunned to see how his songs have had such a poor influence on youth. And then there's Kareena's irritating voiceover who is spoon-feeding the sideffects of drugs. The only positive takeaway apart from Trivedi's music for me was performances of Alia and Diljit.
4. Ki and Ka
There may have been more films on the premise where guy wants to do the household work after marriage, and the wife would be earning for the house. I can recall only Hollywood's 'Intern' which I saw 2 yrs back which had it as a small sub-plot. Kareena usually turns me off, but in the trailer she gave a very positive vibe and Arjun despite all the 'he is non-actor' I keep seeing people call him, he always appealed to me (minus Tevar ofcourse). Balki films tend to follow a pattern, they are light hearted for major portion of 1st half, then inner conflicts occurs leading to a 2nd half that doesn't really engage you followed by a ending where some character always dies. I was hopeful that pattern will break with Ki and Ka, unfortunately it doesn't. Only respite is that the ending is happy this time. I would have loved to see Balki tackle the jealousy Ki (played by Kareena) goes through when Ka (played by Arjun) suddenly being a home-maker starts getting famous to a larger extent. Rather most of the screenplay is wasted on initial dates of Arjun-Kareena and their parents reaction to Arjun's willingness to be home-maker. One may argue that Balki never wanted a serious drama out of this premise, and on that note the film delivers being entertaining. But I would had preferred it the other way.
5. Wazir
It was a movie that was going to use Chess game as a metaphor to narrate the story. And it achieves doing it very well, in a different way where both Farhan and Amitabh are on same side but still brilliantly follows the rules of the game that is revealed at right end of the movie. Bejoy Nambiar movies always have been stylishly shot, be it Shaitan or David, and they also usually have slo-mo filmed songs that are so pleasing to eyes like 'Khoya khoya chand' in Shaitan or 'Ghum huye' in David. And here too 'Tere Bin' is very well picturised. Infact Bejoy gets the Farhan-Aditi marriage angle and the bonding of Farhan-Amitabh work very well. Where he instead fails is the thrilling aspect of movie. Plus with no backdrop of Amitabh's story which actually is the main story of film, it becomes hard to be emotionally involved. Not to forget the feeling of cheated, when the reality behind Neil Nitin Mukesh character is unveiled to us. Maybe Bejoy got too lost in the dramatic aspect of movie that he didn't excel where he usually does. It was still a decent movie to watch, but clearly Bejoy missed a chance to give a much stronger movie with Amitabh-Farhan hitting almost right tones with their performances.
Sex comedies like Kya Kool Hai Hum 3 and Mastizaade were horrible which was on expected lines. Biopic on Azhar was terribly one-dimensional, while Baar Baar Dekho that looked from trailer inspired from Hollywood's 'About Time' was a complete torture despite great chemistry between Sidharth and Katrina.
Then there was the star studded launch movie of Harshvardhan and Saiyami, 'Mirzya' that had some splendid cinematography and good SEL music but the screenplay was at snail's pace and bored you to death. Few other small films that I saw and found myself saying 'WTF is this' were Beimaan Love and Saat Uchakkey.
Lastly, there was the so called paisa vasool movie (not me, Kajol tweeted so), 'Shivaay' that had some eye catching action and good background music by Mithoon, but Ajay's direction was so trashy that you would out of no-where see him shouting at the leading lady in movie that includes a sequence where he literally forces her to have a child for him.
Now, these were the bad movies, but then there were movies that I had lots of expectations from, some from the very start and for others it started with their trailers that were appealing enough. And yet they turned out to be bad to average.
Here's my list of Top 5 most disappointing hindi films of 2016.
1. Fitoor
This movie had fantastic trailer, exceptional music from Amit Trivedi and all the dialogue promos talking of how good this movie is gonna be. Plus, it was a movie from 'Rock On' and 'Kai Po Che' fame director Abhishek Kapoor, and based on famous book 'Great Expectations' (that I am still to read and will surely do). And there's lot to admire for the visuals that are very artistic and full of poetry. Yet somehow, Fitoor turned out to be a complete show-off from outside and baseless without any emotions when you watch the story unfold in the film. Instead of feeling bad for Noor (played by Aditya Roy Kapur) in the movie, my sympathy rather went for Aditya who seemed to have put a very sincere effort in the role and the movie completely betrayed him. Even Tabu's act was for a change not worth appreciating who got some cheesy dialogue lines. Katrina did her part, looked smashingly beautiful, won't criticise her acting as the writing of her character at first place faltered. Also, there's Ajay Devgan in a forgetful special appearance/cameo. Fitoor should easily had been among top5 films of the year, but not to be.
2. Fan
When the 1st teaser came, I was highly skeptical that 'yeh acha ni hone wala'. It was the first theatrical trailer that suddenly made me think that Fan could well go into the very good movies done by Maneesh Sharma like Band Baaja Baaraat and Shudh Desi Romance. And while watching the film it was going so well till the interval. There was a fan Gaurav (played by Shahrukh Khan) who had all life worshipped this celeb Aaryan (played by Shahrukh Khan), and one incident where he gets to meet him by wrong doings makes him develop hatred for him. Now that makes for some watch if only the writing was on synch too which wasnt and thereby the 2nd half went totally downhill. Problem was the idea that Gaurav was all the time seeking a sorry from Aryan and there were no more layers added to his hatred, except for one hard-hitting scene where he enters Aryan's house and destroys his study room full of trophies venting out the anger stored all the time inside. With some other director, 2nd half would had worked because you would had known the plot would try to use slightly similar looking fan try to disguise as celeb. But I didn't expect Maneesh to follow this pattern, that defies logic as in 1st half at no point anyone compares Gaurav being Aryan, but in 2nd half everyone is easily fooled to suddenly think Gaurav is actually Aryan only. Shahrukh's performance was very good, specially when you consider that he did crap films like Chennai Express, Happy New Year and Dilwale before this. In comparison to them, Fan does look so good, plus it was a brave attempt to play a role that shows lot of how Shahrukh is infact in real too like the scene where he tells one of his assistant that if Gaurav is sanki then he isn't less either. Or the dark sides of being a celeb it explores like the scene where he looks at a empty hall where audience doesn't turn up for his performance. Unfortunately, if you are fond of Maneesh Sharma cinema, then you would have expected a perfect movie like I did.
3. Udta Punjab
Surprise! Surprise! Abhishek Chaubey had done both Ishqiya films before this, which made me believe he excels in dark cinema a lot, very much on Vishal Bharadwaj lines. Udta Punjab had the backdrop of how youth are wasting life with drugs, and its effect on 4 main characters, Shahid, Alia, Kareena and Diljit. Expectations were bound to come in, with Amit Trivedi's music once again helping in building it. And not to forget all the censorship drama the movie went through. When it arrived, I was surprised because it never was and still isnt a film that is bad, I still find it a very well made movie. But its not hard-hitting, and that's what I was expecting from it. Rather its more dramatic with minimal dark humor. Shahid's character was too disappointing, could had explored so much more to it, like the scene in jail where he is stunned to see how his songs have had such a poor influence on youth. And then there's Kareena's irritating voiceover who is spoon-feeding the sideffects of drugs. The only positive takeaway apart from Trivedi's music for me was performances of Alia and Diljit.
4. Ki and Ka
There may have been more films on the premise where guy wants to do the household work after marriage, and the wife would be earning for the house. I can recall only Hollywood's 'Intern' which I saw 2 yrs back which had it as a small sub-plot. Kareena usually turns me off, but in the trailer she gave a very positive vibe and Arjun despite all the 'he is non-actor' I keep seeing people call him, he always appealed to me (minus Tevar ofcourse). Balki films tend to follow a pattern, they are light hearted for major portion of 1st half, then inner conflicts occurs leading to a 2nd half that doesn't really engage you followed by a ending where some character always dies. I was hopeful that pattern will break with Ki and Ka, unfortunately it doesn't. Only respite is that the ending is happy this time. I would have loved to see Balki tackle the jealousy Ki (played by Kareena) goes through when Ka (played by Arjun) suddenly being a home-maker starts getting famous to a larger extent. Rather most of the screenplay is wasted on initial dates of Arjun-Kareena and their parents reaction to Arjun's willingness to be home-maker. One may argue that Balki never wanted a serious drama out of this premise, and on that note the film delivers being entertaining. But I would had preferred it the other way.
5. Wazir
It was a movie that was going to use Chess game as a metaphor to narrate the story. And it achieves doing it very well, in a different way where both Farhan and Amitabh are on same side but still brilliantly follows the rules of the game that is revealed at right end of the movie. Bejoy Nambiar movies always have been stylishly shot, be it Shaitan or David, and they also usually have slo-mo filmed songs that are so pleasing to eyes like 'Khoya khoya chand' in Shaitan or 'Ghum huye' in David. And here too 'Tere Bin' is very well picturised. Infact Bejoy gets the Farhan-Aditi marriage angle and the bonding of Farhan-Amitabh work very well. Where he instead fails is the thrilling aspect of movie. Plus with no backdrop of Amitabh's story which actually is the main story of film, it becomes hard to be emotionally involved. Not to forget the feeling of cheated, when the reality behind Neil Nitin Mukesh character is unveiled to us. Maybe Bejoy got too lost in the dramatic aspect of movie that he didn't excel where he usually does. It was still a decent movie to watch, but clearly Bejoy missed a chance to give a much stronger movie with Amitabh-Farhan hitting almost right tones with their performances.
0 Comments