review - Don 2

Warning: Die-hard fans of SRK, advisable to skip this review!
Don 2 suffers from the curse of the sequel:ironic, since the original ‘Don’ itself was not the asli stuff, being a remake of Big B-ka-‘Don’!

Yet, the original, un-original SRK, Farhan Akhtar venture worked & how; very cool, contemporary, with unexpected twists & a wicked ending!
Oh yes, if you are hungry, go for “Don 2” armed with some fresh bread; SRK hams so royally, plenty of meat there for a sandwich & more! In the Shahrukh Khan school of acting, to portray a devilishly bad hero, all you need, is a snarl on your face & a strange rasp of the voice, which I suspect, was inspired by the “Agneepath” voice of Big B!
The old ‘Agneepath’ reminds me of the hero of the new & reloaded version, Hrithik Roshan; He is the surprise factor, wearing a mask ostensibly, a la Mission Impossible! Now here’s where you realize that Farhan Akhtar has taken on too many acting & singing assignments, which are taking their toll on his role as a director! So the Hrithik Roshan we see, for a delightful few minutes, is supposed to be the shorter & minus those biceps SRK, but even if you allow for Bollywood madness, how do you explain, that the masked SRK also talks like Hrithik Roshan?!
Aha, the clash of the Ms World v/s Ms Universe – Priyanka & Lara!!! Priyanka is the legit heroine of the film, but looks dull, washed out & sure she is a police officer, but yeh hindi phillum hai, so some unrealistic glamour would have helped!

Mrs. Bhupathi, yaaney-ki- apni- Lara, on the other hand, plays molly & dolly to Don effortlessly – she probably has, as many scenes as Priyanka, but to escape the humiliation of playing second fiddle to Ms World, Ms Universe takes the escape route, by having her act listed as a ‘special appearance’ … hmmmm!!!
Don sets his sights on a bank in Berlin – there is a convoluted plot of blackmail, storming the bank, shades of ‘Die Hard’ & no, Don doesn’t want money, but the plates which print the money …. yeah, not getting into that – if u must know, go see the movie yourself!
Did I mention our friendly, neighborhood hacker – enter Kunal Kapoor of Rang-de-Basanti fame?! Hez cute, has a phoren, pregnant wife (why we had to know that, I dunno?) & is a jack-of-all trades, as only found in hindi films!
Jab we almost hit the climax, Farhan Akhtar succumbs to the stereotype – so out of the blues, Don joins hands with the cops, helps flush out the bad guys (so does that make him good, bad or what???!) & even manages an instant, two minute, Magi noodles like romance, with Priyanka!!! Et tu, Farhan?
Music – totally forgettable & nothing to write home about!
‘Don ko pakadna mushkil hi nahin, naamumkin hai’ – yeah, wish I hadn’t caught him!

review - MI 4

Confession: Tom Cruise in asli zindagi, I don’t like too much. Not that Cruise Bhai & I are bum chums or anything! It’s just what you read & see, like him leaping up & down a sofa, on Oprah, like a lunatic, or all that buzz about his obsession for scientology ...

But Tom Cruise on the big screen, superstar & smoking hot! Yeah, he looks kinda oddly whitewashed & botoxed too, but still has what it takes!
There’s been so much gup-shup about the movie – some not good, about it lacking the typical Mission Impossible edginess, that I went into the theatre with zero expectations, but came out in a Tom Cruise state of mind, dreamy and happy!
I had to watch the original ‘Mission Impossible’, a couple of times, before I could figure out what the hell was going on! MI 4 takes care of slow-witted folks like me, with a simple, crystal clear, no-brainer plot! It’s a happy jugalbandi, of Bond meets MI!
The regular Hollywood drama locales – Budapest & the Kremlin, which have become to these Hollywood, spy action flicks, what Switzerland is for Yash Chopra films! Defusing nuclear warheads & saving the world from annihilation, with his band of merry-men & women, all in a day’s work for apna Ethan Hunt!
Dubai meri jaan, looks spectacular & I almost got up to join my young bros in the theatre, when they gave the first glimpse of the lush, shiny desert, a standing ovation! And then the Burj Khalifa! So majestic & with Tom Cruise scaling its heights & performing breathtaking stunts, Subhan Allah!
Simon Peg, has always gone under the radar as a comic talent, but he is just right as one of the Tom’s Trio!
Paula Patton, khuda jaaney who she is & she is not even the romantic lead, but still looks fit & fabulous! Equally at ease, whether kicking a blonde assassin of the 126th floor of the Burj Khalifa, or attempting to seduce the Indian millionaire!
It’s India which gets a raw deal – the garish, gaudily dressed extras & outlandish sets, look like something out of Bollywood, in the 70’s! Anil Kapoor – could have portrayed a suave Indian playboy & businessman, but messes up his 'if you blink you’ll miss' appearance, by acting like a buffoon – was it the demands of the script, or Mr. Kapoor’s interpretation, don’t know, but certainly not ‘jhakaas!’
Like the taut action was not enough, the closing act will have you grabbing your handkerchiefs & bawling your mushy hearts out – an ‘aakhon hi aankhon mein ishara ho gaya’ moment between Tom Cruise & his wife, from whom he is separated, for the sake of her safety ….
Tom Cruise in MI 4,
Critics called it a bore,
But I say, gimme more!

review of 'dirty picture'

This one’s a mixed bag!

First, ‘Dirty Picture’ is yakeen se, a ‘Nallu Picture’/’Achha Picture’/’Good Picture’!
Socha na tha, that from the ashes of regressive soaps of the saas-bahu kind, Ekta Kapoor would emerge as a ‘hatt-ke’ producer – a pretty impressive line-up of films like ‘Once upon a time in Mumbai’, ‘Love Sex or Dhoka’ & now a movie based on the life of the first lady of suggestive item numbers & more, the inimitable ‘Sillukku’ Smitha!
So taaliyaan for Jumping Jack Jeetu ki beti!
For fellow Palghat Iyer, nammu Vidya Balan, a standing ovation! From Parineeta, you’ve come a long way babe! What a gutsy, uninhibited bold act, proving that she is one of the most versatile actors Bollywood can boast of currently!

Then there’s my all time favorite, Nasserudin Shah – he is a riot, playing those typical fossil like heroes of the 80’s, arrogant, absurd & delusional! Some hilarious scenes like the one where he looks 90+ and skips home with his diploma and has an actress half his age, playing his mother! Plenty of jabs at the foolish & illogical idolizing of over the hill actors!
BUT!!!!! I belong to the generation (phuleez let us not detour into ‘she must be quite old’ lane & stick to the review!) that saw the rise & fall of the one & only ‘Sillukku’ – you first encountered her on the large screen with horror & moralistic outrage, then graduated to grotesque fascination & somewhere down the line, grew quite fond of our feisty fabric queen - Don’t get me wrong – not taking away from Vidya Balan’s performance in any way – but for a diehard South Indian, there is a gap between our crude, earthy, one of a kind “Sillukku’ & ‘Dirty Picture’s’ refined ‘Silk’.
Credit to Vidya Balan that despite all the jhatkas, matkas, thrusts & cleavage, she never looks vulgar – which unfortunately does not allow ‘Silk’ to become ‘Sillukku’! Was it my imagination, or were there a lot of Jeetu-Sreedevi-Tohfa-Mawaali like costumes & picturisation, poses et all! Maybe Ekta wanted to squeeze in a small tribute to daddy dearest?!
Let’s talk about our Rascallas, the Tamizh film heroes – again, much as Nasser has attempted, has not been able to crack the complete package that is a middle aged leading men of the 1980’s! So funny moments definitely, but Mr. Shah’s performance, dare I say it, does verge on a spoof like quality most of the time! You still love him & never forget what a great actor he is – but no denying that there are comical tinges to his role!
Yeah, let me not forget that if it’s a Balaji production, we have to suffer Tusss (how many S’s is that?)ar Kapoor – couldn’t quite figure his look & the wig! Let me just say, a great actor he ‘aint, so thank Gawd for him that he’s got Ekta Kapoor as a sister!
Life & times of Silk Smitha – a story sincerely & well told, but the movie is not a patch on the phenomenon that was Silluku Smita - she left her mark on the fabric of Indian cinema , a trend setter ! After her came Nylex Nalini & ‘Polyester Padmini’!!! (LOL!)
But then, comparisons are odious, so season my comments with a huge dose of salt!
PS: Ooo la la la, Bhappi Da, not bad!Buy yourself one more gold chain!