Saturday, April 20, 2013

Missed Out Reviews

Writing 3-4 lines views on films that I have seen in last 2 months and not reviewed, would prefer to write in details later whenever I could.  
                                                                   English Movies

The Illusionist : It had a decent story, but the cast put me off.. didn't like them much and as a result except for some magic tricks or that last one in particular I found the film quite ordinary.

The Sixth Sense : Totally loved it. Amazing screenplay, the way its edited hence keeping you not think of other alternative the story could be showing you, and when the climax comes you are shocked. To a certain extent the logic behind the movie works very well when I rewind back. The first sequence would be among one of best ones I have ever seen, artistic and forming the way to a great story. Great performances by Bruce Willis and Halley Joel.

The Shashank Redemption : Excellent Movie, now I know why it is rated no.1 on Imdb, because it says so much about 'Hope', if you are pessimistic by nature, then this is a must watch movie for you. Morgan Freeman and Tim Robbins in perhaps their best or one of best performances ever (those who have seen more of their films, could say it with much more confidence). Also, here too the first sequence is among the best ones ever, how the background voice increases as we are told Tim is about to enter jail. The shots of jail, the life Tim leads initially and how he adapts to it making it useful for himself. But, there comes a point when you breakdown, he does too, yet he finds a way out of it because he always believe in one thing 'Hope'. Also, when someone asks me your favourite friends based movies, this one will always be there now.

Lincoln : The best thing I found about this movie was that they didnt show a young age to old age biopic on Abraham Lincoln, instead they took one particular event of his life and layed entire emphasis on how he won that event. And the oscar winning performance by Daniel Day Lewis.

Silver Linings Playbook : How bradley cooper fights his mental condition through help of Jennifer Lawrence who has her own problems too, along with the finale dance performance that is quite hillarious in its own ways. Jennifer Lawrence looks smoking sexy, and a great performance too. I liked the screenplay but it is one of those films that I liked but didn't love. Robert De Niro's superstitions sequences were funny too.

Obvilion : Another of those confusing hollywood movies (I get confuse a lot easily). But, the screenplay is too slow, all the twists that comes much later therefore doesn't help much. Even Tom Cruise couldn't lift the movie with his performance. Morgan Freeman I felt had too short a role.

Oz The Great and Powerful : Decent adventure film, though the final act was a let down for me. James Franco as Oz was pretty good.

The Place beyond the Pines : The camera follows Ryan in 1st shot, until he reaches the stunt place as his face is revealed. The pace and character of Ryan Gosling matches 'Drive' quite a lot. But still it kept me interested, but a certain change of events, and film goes resting over Bradley Cooper, one of reasons why I felt movie started loosing steam, plus the two school age kids never interested me, except for the scene where son of Ryan seeks revenge from Bradley Cooper and his son. But to be fair to the movie, the role of Ryan is rightly not kept too much, as per requirement of the story. Yet, the movie turns out just Nice for me.

Django Unchained : Tarantino's magic in the movie once more, the way he plays with camera making shots look stylish with those quick zoom in's, and the dialogue conversations. Christoph Waltz was spectacular in his funny reactions. Leonardo di caprio in a evil villian role and Jamie Foxx had his own scenes to shine too. Also, Sameul L Jackson gets good cameo.

Zero Dark Thirty : Fantastic screenplay depicting how Osama Bin Laden was finally caught, but all the struggle, hardwork, pain and loss that they had to go through before finding his location. Also, loved how they shot the mission osama sequence, the lighting and editing spot on there.
                                                                               
 Hindi Movies  

Commando : Some great action scenes by Vidyut Jamwal, but the treatment and the feel to the movie is very old fashioned which turns the movie into a average fare. Jaideep Ahlawat was the pick of the actors, specially those santa-banta jokes..

Nautanki Saala : Not a great follow up to Vicky Donor by Ayushmman Khurana. The writing is the main culprit though. There are some laughable moments throughout the movie, but in totality the film falls flat plus the role of dumb girl Nandini plays (not as dumb as Race/Race2 had), doesn't help the screenplay. The songs appear more like forced into the narrative too, though they are good to ears as music of film is very good. Average movie in the end.

Chashme Baddoor : Quite enjoyable movie, the shayaris of Divyendu, the bholapan of Ali Zafar, and the filmipan of Siddharth, wonderful triology it was. Tapsee Pannu has her cute moments too. Only Anupam Kher track was out of place, and un-neccessary. I liked that David Dhawan kept the humour more likeable, and not vulgar or cheap like Rascals was. I love the choreography of Andha ghoda race mein dauda. The flashbacks scenes were funny, so were the two ideas of Siddharth that Divyendu spoils in the 2nd half. There are places where the jokes don't bring a laugh, still as a whole I very much liked the movie.

Himmatwala : Wonderful spoof on Psycho, a spoof on 80s dialogue writing.. but Sajid Khan failed to create the emotional drama, even the dialogues in such scenes looked silly, so did his direction. Only Tamannah was good thing in the movie for me apart from those 1st two points I mentioned. Even Ajay Devgan hammed a lot. Below Average movie.

Aatma : Screenplay never generates interest, it may not be kind of horror movies Vikram Bhatt or Ram Gopal Verma makes, yet it doesn't lives upto the need of the genre. Nawazuddin is decent, Bipasha has done enough of such films now, so nothing spectacular from her side either. The small kid was good though. Average Movie.

Rangrezz : I quite liked this movie, because the friendship angle was very well shown plus Jackky Bhagnani gave a very honest performance. Though, the close up shots of the injuries he and his friends get was hard to watch on screen. Only problem I had was, why did they show the kidnapped boy and girl's parents as politicians who are very dangerous, when in the end they did almost nothing, apart from death of Jackky's grandmother. The final scene was good, not the typical hindi film ending, more realistic.. I felt the film had good hardhitting moments.

Mere Dad ki Maruti : Saqib Saleem is funny in another comedy movie. The movie has lots of funny moments specially when his dad's car gets lost by him, but at many places the comedy doesn't work out. Also, Rhea Chakroborty wasn't convincing enough in her performance. Average Movie.

3G : Too slow screenplay, and when the suspense gets revealed.. you feel what the hell it was. By trailer, I felt Neil may have great role to do here, but it didn't turn out so. Writing as well as director to blame for the failure of this film. Below Average.

Jolly L.L.B : If you remove the Amrita-Arshad love angle which I don't know why our directors love having in a film that doesn't require it, then this was a superb film that had comedy, drama and a message too. Boman Irani and Saurabh Shukla had great supporting performances too.


Good entertaining animation movie : The Croods

Directed by : Kirk De Micco and Chris Sanders
Imdb link -> http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0481499/


Very good animation movie, entertains throughout. I loved Grug (Nicolas Cage), Eep (Emma Stone) and Guy (Ryan Reynolds), and yea those funny tunes that Belt (Chris Sanders) sings at awkward situations.

Love the scene where Grug tries to think of a idea in a desperate situation, or when guy offers different kinds of boots to everyone to walk with Eep's dialogue 'Where are my feeeeeeeeeeeeet'. Also, when Grug tries to sacrifice his life.

Special mention  to that member of family who is always angry, and quite wild. (Dont remember name) And the 'still alive' dialogue of Grug's mom. Only the food scenes were tough to watch, thankfully it was just a animation movie therefore they didn't look that yucky as it would had else looked.

Also, great cinematography. I liked the story, the dad is over-caring and realizes much late that he can't keep his family hiding inside a cave all the time, they want fun specially daughter Eep who likes adventures.

If you love animation movies, then most likely you would like this one too.

Watch it for great 1st half and Konkana/Emraan performances : Ek Thi Daayan

Directed by : Kannan Iyer
Imdb link -> http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2406676/


I loved the story the moment I read it, and was curious to watch the film hence. Upto the 1st half everything went right, but the film slips badly in 2nd half.

Konkana is to certain extent very scary, the way she delivers her dialogues, or the eye expressions she gives, her movements.. though in a 2nd half scene she goes over the top but the director is to blame there. Her first entry scene, or the one where she plays hide and seek, and her change of voice as she counts were my favs scenes.

1st half except for dream sequence (which was unwanted, but then you cant make a horror film without it). Intermission gives you feeling of what will happen next, it keeps you interested and the director plays with the story of Bobo (Emraan) past life when he was haunted by Daayan much more, instead of all the typical horror elements one gets to see.

But in 2nd half, the screenplay goes haywire, even the good songs totey udh gaye or yaaram create less impact, the entry of Kalki also appears bit too late, her character should had been etched better. Then the final culmination to the story is where the director takes it to the same tried formula's where a human fights evil in a dramatic way, defying logics that had been applied until then. Plus, a particular twist which I thought before watching the movie or while watching the movie... also falls flat when you rewind the entire story again. Wonder why Daayan  had to wait so long to return again. Also, what was with the over-dose of chotti thing (daayan ki shakti choti mein bandh hoti hai), If i was the director, I would use it only twice, once in favour of daayan, and once against. Baat khatam.

Emraan Hashmi does a commendable work once more, the way he handles the scenes where he feels haunted by his past. His 1st magic act, and then the kalki one were best scenes. Huma Quereshi is good, I specially love her dance steps in Totey udh gaye (just like I loved her in O Womaniya). Kalki is okay. Special mention to Vishesh Tiwari and Sara Arjun, who play young Bobo and Misha (sister of bobo), they were super good, cute and funny.

Overall, Ek Thi Daayan had in it to be one of best horror/supernatural movies, Kannan does extremely well in giving a dark feel to the movie plus keeping suspense till interval, but a weak 2nd half spoils the chance.


Verdict : AVERAGE

Friday, March 29, 2013

Trailer : Ghanchakkar



Raj Kumar Gupta's first two movies were serious ones but they did show his capability to film entertaining scene when the situation aint favourable for it. This time, its a total fun ride and how good he has done from the looks of trailer.

Emraan Hashmi could have pulled off one of his memorable roles pretty much like Shanghai here. Vidya Balan loooking super naughty and typical punjabi with those dialogues.  Rajesh and Namit also in supporting roles would be great to watch.

That Kulfi scene was hillarious, also the choice of actors on 3 masks. And the Ghajini dialogue.

Amit Trivedi's music would appeal to me or not is a question. I found the song with the trailer good but audio wise not special. Last time around he and Raj Kumar Gupta gave me NOKJ, his 2nd best soundtrack till date. Hoping he repeats that this time too.


Saala, Ghajini ka Salman Khan hai ...
Shahrukh, Ghajini mein Shahrukh Khan tha.. Salman Khan :/
Saale bandar, itna bhi pata nahi hai Ghajini mein Saif Ali Khan tha..
Haaaaaaaaaaaain.

Trailer : Ek Thi Daayan



Very Spooky, and the story remains the plus point for my so much interest in this movie. Bas few things now, will they use all those stereotypes (door opening slowly, cat, dream death scenes etc) in abundance or have a change. And, the climax would have anything wierd about a human vs ghost fight. (Aatma failed badly in that department for me)

For now, it appears to be good horror movie. I still couldn't understand those lines recited when daayan shots start, and wonderful use of Kalki shot over it. I can't say who is the real daayan, if there are more than 1 daayan or there are no daayans. Special mention to the way trailer begins, no image with conversation and spooky background and then the footsteps of daayan going in other direction.

Even Kalki looking very promising in the trailer, which I was little doubtful with the last trailer/teaser.

And the final dialogue of Konkana 'So sweet, I could just eat you up'.

Waiting for Musiiiiiic and then  the film. Yaaram is too good and 'Totey Udh Gaye' growing on me with each listenings.


Jab tak tum apna kal nahi phenkoge, tab tak hamara kal saans kaise lega ? 

Thursday, March 28, 2013

Trailer : Yamla Pagla Deewana



I didn't understand some of the spoofs (that kyu one specially), the one by Dharmendra on their own YPD was best one.. and Maggi dialogue in the end. But 2 worrying points, one is the character of chimpanzee that will bring irritating humour into the screenplay, and other is the action sequences of Sunny Deol that look way over the top  with a capital T. Then, the romantic angle is always the weak link of such movies, and this time it looks Sunny Deol has it too. I would have loved them to carry forward the heroines too, that would have kept the focus just on the cons and spoofs of all of them.

Aneways, I liked the 1st version in parts, so if this one does the same then I wont mind at all. Also, Neha Sharma has always been among actresses I love watching.. looks too good.


Aap aur aapke bhai ke beech mein kitne minute ka fark hai ? 
Do.. Do minute.
Do minute ka 
Yeh paida hua, maine maggi banaayi.. aur prem aa gaya. 

Trailer : Bombay Talkies



Appears to be a quality movie, probably not commercial like Dhobi Ghat kind.  Karan Johar story focusses on 3 way relationship with Rani playing Journalist. Rani-Randeep pair would be something fresh, also Saqib Saleem in a hatke role after having done 2 rom-coms in a row. Zoya Akhtar story is about desire of kid to meet a star i.e Katrina. Anurag Kashyap  story is about a aam guy Vineet (played brother to Nawaazuddin in Gow) who wants to meet Amitabh Bachchan. Dibakar one I am not sure, maybe its about struggle of a theatre actor. Nawazuddin is part of it and he easily was the pick of the trailer.

How these 4 stories are linked or if not linked how would the screenplay be. Good thing is, all 4 directors are best chosen with the stories they would be very much comfortable with.

Right now, my order is Dibakar > Karan > Anurag > Zoya

I wonder if they have music for the movie, or just background scores.. as its tribute to 100 yrs of hindi cinema.