Ferrari Ki Sawari- Enjoy the Ride!!!

Ferrari -- throws up images of a Red Prancing horse, the high pitched scream of a 800 Hp formula one car, whizzing through Monza and of course of excellence in engineering and design - A reminder that technologically superior products can also be beautiful while giving ultimate performance (Apple iPad, iPhone..case in point)...lest I digress further, let me get on with the review.

The movie starts up in true Vinod Chopra style.. setting the mood for the character - in this case Sharman Joshi - a Parsi single dad, bringing up his son, riding a scooter alongwith his son, inadvertently breaks a traffic light. Now being an upright RTO clerk and wanting to set the correct example for his son, and finding no traffic havaldar in sight, he looks for one, and ensures that he is challaned and pays a fine. Now, this seems far-fetched and not exactly in the nature of normal humans...but drives the point home.

 By then we have been introduced to Rustom - Sharman Joshi, Ritwik Sahore and Kayo, Boman Irani as Deboo- Sharman's father and a disgruntled old man, The Honest Police inspector - who does not shy away from impounding wrongly parked foreign cars, the traffic constable - a big fan of Sachin Tendulkar and who wants to avoid controversy by NOT picking up foreign cars as they may belong to politicians or industrialist and he may be pulled up for the actually doing his job, Kayo's  cricket coach and of course the Over the Top, Punjabi Wedding Planner -

The story is based around Kayo- a talented budding cricketer, who belongs to a middle class family.  Rustom finds it difficult to provide for Kayo's cricketing gear but somehow manages. However, one day an oppotunity comes knocking at their door - A coaching camp to Lords, London, for which Kayo will definitely be selected, however, the cost is Rs One and Half Lac, which is the deal breaker for the financially strapped Rustom. A Lac and Half, a disgruntled Grandad (Bade papa), an unscrupulous friend of grand papa- Dharmadhikari-played by Paresh Rawal , all threaten to destroy this boys dream.

Opportunity knocks and how. There is money to be made but there is a rider, A Ferrari is needed for a Corporator's sons wedding and the wedding planners best bet is Rustom. How everything falls in place is something that you must watch for yourself but there are some key takeaways from this movie:-
(a) Under the right conditions, if given a chance, Everyone is capable of crime - even the most             honest  among us.
(b) However, when the honest commit a crime, the element of guilt is too much and they cant live with it.. so they definitely try to make it up...

Overall, the movie scores for its simplicity and some genuine acting skills. Characterisation is good, however some of them like the coach suffer, as there isnt enough time or emphasis given to them in the script. Sharman as Rustom is very Likeable and does an excellent job.. Ritwik, the mac Donalds find, is good, however, the honours once again go to Boman irani, as the irascible old Parsi Gentleman, he is in his element.  Rest all have done a competent job... The movie lacks  energy and Vidya Balan's item number could'nt do much to increase it.. However, the pace is brisk and the kids will definitely love it...

A must watch with children and a May watch if you are on your own...

Rating - *** 1/2

Shanghai - You have been Shanghaied !!!!!

Shanghai

Evolution is a fact of life....and Shanghai is an evolution in darwanian terms..Would love to watch some more movies like these... No patronising, no moral lectures...says it just the way it is.... A brilliant strategic Chess game , where the moves have already been decided before the game has started..!!!

The movie is set in Bharatpur or some mofussil town, where the ruling party wants to set up an IBP- India Business Park. Now, as with all development, some one has to pay the price, and obviously, It has to be the poor tribals who have to be displaced from their land (how obvious).

The characters are well etched.. Abhay Deol as the Collector - A tamilian..reserved, quiet and crafty, Kalki as the idealistic crusader, whose dad is an army general accused in a land scam, Emraan- as Jogi,  the sleazy photographer's assistant, always on the look out for new business,  

Farookh sheikh as the flexible and compliant Principal Secretary, Supriya Pathak as the Cold Blooded CM and a host of characters to complete the plot...

Enter the dragon...Dr Ahemadi (Prasenjit Banerjee) ..in a la Medha Patkar mode.. kurta and all, who comes to tell the poor tribals to fight for their right. He is Kalki's teacher and more. Kalki is forewarned to tell Ahemadi not to come as his life is under threat, but that is brished off by ahemadi. However, the threat was real and Ahemadi is mowed down by a truck in front of all his supporters and detractors.

The spider's web starts to un ravel with the CM ordering an enquiry and makes Abhay Deol the headmaster. The cover up game starts with the police and the deeper our collector goes, the dirtier it gets. The criminals display no fear of the law , which is frightening as it holds out no hope for the common man, Emraan is uncharateristically cast, with a past and a debatable future. Kalki is the only weak link. The ending is ironic and cynical... no answers..just reality and thats the way it is...

Summing up, a smart political thriller vishwanthan anand would be proud of the moves played by all the characters. To be savoured and enjoyed. 

Extremely well directed, written, acted ...... Shanghai is a masterful  dark tale narrated by a Masterful story teller, Dibakar (maybe he shall not be called "Debacle" Banerjee any more..:)

Rating  -  ****1/2

A Hate Story - Review

                                                   Theatrical Trailer - Hate Story

Been a busy weekend in order to de-stress, I walked in to see A Hate Story. Did my stress levels go down..hard to say...but the movie turned out nothing like what the reviews of promo's made it to be..

The story is a simple one. Two journalists (Paoli Dam and Nikhil Dwivedi) expose a Cement company of some underhand dealings. The CEO (Siddharth - Gulshan Devaih) is angry (Obviously !!! Duh!!!) and exacts revenge for the same on Paoli..by first Hiring her, Wooing Her and then Firing her. Like the old adage, Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, she discovers, to her joy, i guess (as it gave her some ammunition), that she is pregnant with Sids child. So she blackmails him...Big mistake..He gets even by kidnapping and sterilising her.

On the warpath (Traces of Khoon Bhari Maang), she becomes a High Class Call girl and then systematically gets into the pants of the Company's CEO, the politician (Mohan Kapur) who is helping them... to play a dangerous game of spy vs spy between companies, with the sole aim of bringing about Cementec's and the CEO's downfall. She succeeds (Thereby getting across a message--MBA, CA are not required by women to succeed.. )and pays back the CEO in his own coin. However, there is a twist in the tale and the movie dosent end the way you expect it would. For a detailed review of the story- read this review.

Paoli is confident as Kavvya - the journalist, victim and call girl. However, she is not able to evoke pathos on her plight...
Gulshan (Sid) is good as the overawed stammering son, the ruthless CEO and the charming womaniser...

The movie's redeeming feature is its pace which does not slow down and is not encumbered by too many songs. The editing is logical however the screenplay is too simplistic and naive. I really dont think people are that naive now a days atleast... so that goes against the movie. A slighly complicated set of characters would have made the movie a gripping one the watch. However, all said and done.. you can watch the movie and enjoy it..
Rating - **1/2

AGENT VINOD - Unravelling the Spider Web

Agent Vinod or A (gent) Vinod, sounds confusing..well, wait till you watch the movie and then decide. Did the movie live up to its hype, well, read on to make up your mind.

The movie starts in James Bond style, with the desert of death (Afghanistan) being shown in  all glory and Agent Vinod being beaten black and blue by the ISI agent 'Morka' or something like that. Vinod wins their confidence by revealing an Indian agent to them and then suddenly all hell breaks loose. Vinod beats up atleast 40 guys (sic), saves the Indian agent and somehow, 'Mujra' girl and escapes from the desert, in true James Bond style (meaning, blows up a few trucks carrying armed men and hey presto...

The narrator then goes on to explain how the break up of the soviet union and their corrupt generals are putting up tactical nuclear warheads for sale to the higest bidder, in this case, the Lashkar... They go on to explain the involvement of a large number of middlemen, russian mafia and so on who are a part  of this nexus (the mafia don Abu Khan - Ram Kapoor, The Colonel, Prem Chopra as Kazan, a business tycoon- Metla, Kareen kapoor as Dr Ruby Mendes a.k.a Iram Parveen Bilal, Rajat Kapoor as the ISI Chief, Morka as the Renegade ISI agent and a host of other characters...(which also includes Gulshan Grover). I have run out of breadth.

The story moves from Afghanistan-India- St Petersburg-Morocco(where a large part of the movie has been shot)- Riga- Karachi-Somalia ....phew...and back to India at breakneck speed, with never a dull moment. The story is quite simple - The terrorist have got their hands on a Nuclear bomb, the detonator is in a Omar Khayyam Rubyat and the book is for sale (lot 242) at an auction in Morocco. Vinod's mission is to find ther detonator and the bomb so that it can be neutralised. I shall leave it at that

The screen play is complex and so is the execution of the plot. The story has been worked out in detail, however, the time allotted 2 hrs and 40 mins approx, is not enough to make it understandable and coherent for the masses at large. What comes to the fore is all the action (the car chases, the hand to hand combats..) wherein, Vinod always manages to polish of foes with a ration of 1:20. Like I said earlier, the story is simple but the execution is complex, which actually makes you think about all what happened even after the movie for you to understand it. But one thing is clear-India has to be saved at all costs to avert a nuclear war between India and Pakistan.

The acting is quite so-so. Saif as Agent Vinod does not impress you as much as James Bond did. I think its largely because he tries to keep a wooden, expressionless face throughout trying to portray the tough RAW agent, and somehow does not connect with the audience. His seeming indestructability also makes the action sequence ho-hum.  Kareena looks confused about her role and she has no fire (like we are accustomed too from her). The Chemistry between Kareena and Saif is quite insipid and does not evoke any sympathy for her or them. Prem Chopra is menacing at times but loses the plot midway. The host of other baddies are efficient and do their job competently.

All in all, the movie is quite complex to follow. The director had a taut script and he has tried to incorporate all the logical steps in it, but in doing so, he has introduced a large number of characters, too many sub plots and two extremely avoidable songs. The action sequences like the car chase, fights etc are well done. The back ground music score has a nice rock feel and is edgy in the right places. The movie has been made in James Bond style (as we all lap up Bond films anyway) but without the suave edginess of  Craig, Pierce and Sean...

All in all - a decent time pass, but keep your wits about or else you shall not understand what happened. I would rate it a 2 1/2 stars as the much awaited film does not live up to the hype and leaves you generally confused and cold.

 **1/2

Paan Singh Tomar - Catch me If you Can

There are some movies that you want dont want to watch just because...no reason..you may hate it or love it..its a different issue, but you will watch it.. Ek Deewana Tha was one of them..and the other was Paan Singh Tomar. I shall readily admit that I was under intense pressure to watch this movie, so like a good socialble human being I succumbed .. And for the umpteenth time in my life (listening to advice and recommendation from friends is  mostlly beneficial ) ... I admit I just loved the movie.

The story is a rather simple one (and forgotten as it has never been a part of our educational curriculum). Paan Singh Tomar (PST as I shall call him), belongs to a smemall village in Modena district of UP (near chambal). He joins the army after Independence and just loves to eat.. he is rather rudely told by one of the Mess Havaldars that if he wants to hog, become a sportsman, so PST goes and tells his Div O that he wants to become a sportsman. The DO, in jest gives him a pack of Ice Cream and tells him that if he can deliver this to a majors house, before it melts, he can become one..So PST does it..in less than 4 mins..

He then does well in the local 5000 mtrs race and to his CO's shock informs him that his uncle is a "Baaghi" (an euphemism for a dacoit).  He tells him that in Chambal, no one becomes a dacoit for pleasure and therefore, they are known as Baaghi's. The tete a tete continues and the CO feels that PST is a complete misfit and has a lot of latent anger..His DO gives a suggestion of sending him to sports school to hone his talents and channelise his energy.

At the sports school, he tells his coach (Maj Randhawa) that he has come here so that he can eat well.. and in the very first 5000 mtrs race, trumps his son-in-law. The coach is worried and requests PST to take up another race, which at first he vehemently disagrees, but when the coach tells him that his daughters happiness is at stake..he understands the situation and agrees to run the Steeple chase.

The story goes on about how he makes a national record, looses in the asian games just because he was forced to wear spikes.. and then finally at the age of 30+ goes and wins a gold medal at the International Defense meet ...a competition in  which he was allowed to participate as compensation for not sending him to fight in the 1965 war inspite of his age..

After his retirement, the hard facts of life hit him and when he realises that his land has been usurped by his cousin, he goes from pillar to post to retrieve it, tries all legal means but the final humiliation comes when the local policeman tells him that his medal and army background have no value, and throws his medal and papers away.. he decides enough is enough and has todo something. In the meanwhile, incensed by PST going to the police, his cousin attacks his home, bludgeons his mom to death (luckily his wife and kids run away). PST then takes the law into his own hands and becomes a Baaghi. The irony is that his son joins the army and he has to become a dacoit.

So as a dacoit, he has to kidnap people to get money for firearms and all that, which he does, with the sole aim of killing his cousins and avenging his mothers death and sons beating. He achieves his aim, takes revenge and thereafter does not know what to do. His fame has spread far and wide and even police approach him to take revenge on their enemies. He realises that there is no return to his earlier life.

The movie is a sad reminder of how we treat our sportsmen, of how the very people supposed to protect us become our tormentors, leaving no recourse for justice. It clearly depicts the tough life in our villages, the internal politics, the wheels within wheels within wheels. The entire story is narrated by PST, to a journalist.

The movie is superbly shot, the chambal ravines look desolate and inhospitable . Irrfan as PST is there in almost every frame (its his movie through and through) and he is simply brilliant. Mahie Gill as PST's wife is endearing (though she does not have much of a role, as a matter of fact, no one else has).  Effortless acting and some superb direction, screenplay and editing  make it one of the best movies in the past few years. The locations are authentic, the diction is local ... Just go an watch it..it gives Bandit Queen a run for its money..

Rating - ****1/2 ('cause nothings perfect)..