Shortkut...The Con is On

Rating : 2/10
Release Date : 10th July, 2009
Time : 138 minutes
Director : Neeraj Vohra; Writer : Anees Bazmee; Music : Shankar Mahadevan
Starring : Arshad Warsi, Akshaye Khanna, Amrita Rao
The con was on us. I’m going to struggle to name anything more than one good thing in this one, it wasn’t even a straight forward time pass, brainless film. It was a twisted & convoluted brainless time pass film, hence double the agony. Not content with the pathetic jokes, the relatively decent ones already having been shown in the trailer, they add a love story, a story of a struggling director/writer, an ‘Abhimaan’-esque angle, some very irritating chawl neighbours, some more farcical twists and turns and finally many ill-conceived item numbers, which make you sink lower and lower in your seat.


The only good thing was Akshaye Khanna, who almost literally stood tall amongst the ruins around him, actually looking convincing even when it wasn’t. Amrita Rao wasn’t bad, would at least credit her with a decent effort. The one who really does seem to have lost his way is Arshad Warsi. After Sehar and Waisa Bhi Hota Hai Part II (and maybe two Munnabhai’s), I think it has been nothing but downhill in terms of acting. I don’t think he’s become bad – just that he’s not choosing the right roles or scripts and is stuck in a rut.


It sometimes hurts me to be so harsh, especially since I know the kind of effort that goes in making a film. But I am convinced that with just a little thought, a little more interrogation of the script, this film could actually have been decent. In its current avatar though, it would’ve been the perfect cure for insomnia, except that its too loud and irritating…

Hangover

Rating : 8/10
Release Date : 26th June, 2009 (India)
Time : 100 minutes
Director : Todd Phillips; Writer : Jon Lucas, Scott Moore;
Starring : Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms, Zach Galifikianis, Justin Bartha, Heather Graham, Mike Tyson, Ken Jeong

A group of 3 friends and a very eccentric future brother-in-law go on a trip to Las Vegas. When they wake up in the morning, their fancy suite is a mess, there is a very long legged model tip-toeing out trying not to disturb the chicken clucking around, the friends are in various stages of undress and sleeping on the floor or sofa’s or anywhere but on the bed, the dentist is missing a tooth, there is a tiger in the bathroom, a baby in the closet, instead of their Mercedes, the car valet gets them a police car. And oh, I almost forgot, the groom is missing and none of the friends can remember a thing about the previous night. Sounds interesting ? Curious as to what really happened that night ? I think it was brilliantly put together, and made for a highly enjoyable film as we, along with the friends, discovered the previous nights shenanigans….



I don’t want to spoil the fun, so will restrain myself from revealing anything. The interesting thing is that the characters are well-built as well. One is a dentist, who’s in a very constricting relationship with a very dominating woman, the type who wants to be called as soon as you check in, who finds strippers & Las Vegas offensive etc. There is a school teacher who cant wait to leave his family, the little tykes in school, take their school trip money and escape to Vegas. The brother-in-law deserves a book all unto himself. His choice of underwear, his demeanour, the fact that there is a restraining order against him not to go near any school or Chuck E Cheese, his satchel bag, all point towards a person we’d like to know better.

Throughout the film, we’re on tenterhooks as try to find out what really happened and it all ties in neatly at the end, except for the chicken, which curiously never gets explained. The jokes fly in thick and fast. Different eccentric people make their respective entry’s and exits (am really restraining myself from revealing more).

It’s a simple story, well told, well enacted, great music, and it has just the right degree of suspense. I deduct some points for the slightly implausible ending and their failure to reveal the origin of the chicken. And I just loved the band at the wedding in the end – I think India could use someone like them !

Ice Age3 : Dawn of the Dinosaurs

Rating : 6/10
Release Date : 3rd July, 2009 (India)
Time : 94 minutes
Director : Carlos Saldhana; Music : John Powell
Starring (voices of): Ray Romano, Dennis Leary, Queen Latifah, John Leguizamo, Simon Pegg

Its not as funny as the previous two movies but still a pretty good film. Scrat has a companion. Ellie is expecting. Diego is not sure whether he should still hang around – he’s finding it difficult to catch gazelle’s and is hopelessly out of shape. Sid is feeling the need for a family. And that’s why, when he finds some giant eggs, he decides to keep them.

There is an interesting new character introduced as well. Buck, the English-accented, crocodile Dundee style, tough talking, free-wheeling, dinosaur-tracking creature. There are enough gags to keep the kids in splits. I don’t remember laughing out loud too often, while I remember having a stomach ache in the previous two versions from laughing too much.

There may even be a fourth but methinks I doth have seen my last one….

Kambakkth Ishq

Rating : 2/10
Release Date : 3rd July, 2009
Time : 142 minutes
Director : Sabbir Khan; Writer : Sabbir Khan, Ishita Moitra; Music : Anu Malik
Starring : Akshay Kumar, Kareena Kapoor, Aftab Shivdasani, Amrita Arora, Vindu Dara Singh and Guest Appearances by Sylvester Stallone, Denise Richards, Boman Irani, Kirron Kher, Brandon Routh

All the beautiful locations, the Hollywood stars guest appearances, the cool threads, the various long legs, lingerie and swimsuit shots, the repeated use of swear words cannot hide the fact that the movie is an asinine farce, running on empty, with no script worthy of its name, no plot, nothing holding the film together. Everything in the movie reeks of trying to be big, bigger than anything before – the stunts, the Hollywood biggies, the completely unnecessary locations (the whole Italy shoot was redundant). The sad thing is that the current movie-starved audience may still make this one a commercial success...kambakkth luck !


Akshay Kumar, super stuntman hates Kareena (a part time model who is trying to be a surgeon). Just to emphasize that point and ensure no one doubts this fact, they call each other bitch/dog/bastard a couple of dozen times. At one point, though, Kareena has to perform an operation on Akshay and mistakenly leaves her musical watch (which plays ‘om mangalam’) inside him. Then she has to pretend to be in love with him to retrieve it. That’s really about it. Except there are many stupid sub-plots to accomodate Aftab Shivdasani, Amrita Arora, Kirron etc etc

Kareena pouts as only she can, shows off her long legs, her size zero figure and cleavage repeatedly. No complaints so far. Akshay, though, is so way over the top, – right from his clothes, which reek of someone desperately trying to be cool, to his very jerky and loud acting, that it makes you cringe. He seems to have lost his way. He’s much better than this and I wish he would do a pure, slick action thriller and not farcical comedies.


Its loud, screechy, makes you laugh about once per 25 attempts, vulgar in parts, completely implausible in all other parts. The kids and all of those with a similar IQ loved it. All others will hate it and will think twice before watching the next Akshay starrer, especially after its coming so close to his previous turkeys.

P.S. There’s plenty of eye candy throughout the film but the sheer number of such shots and the swear words really make me question the U certificate.

New York

Rating : 6/10
Release Date : 26th June, 2009
Time : 153 minutes
Director : Kabir Khan; Writer : Sandeep Srivastava; Music : Pritam
Starring : John Abraham, Katrina Kaif, Neil Nitin Mukesh, Irrfan

In most countries, civilized ones that is, if the cops come and arrest you on mere suspicion (no evidence), detain you for 6-9 months, torture you, beat you, deprive you of your basic civil rights (food / clothing / right to a lawyer) and racially insult you / your religion, its regarded as a major human rights violation. In the USA, this is routine procedure as per the Patriots Act.


This point and how such procedures / violence in turn breed terrorism is the central point of Kabir Khan’s second film, New York, which traces the lives of three friends who are immigrants in USA and how the events of 9/11 impacted them and so many others like them.

They are college students, John, Katrina and Neil, there is an unspoken love triangle amongst them, lots of fun and games, laughter, partying. 9/11 happens towards the end of their college, shaking things up. Unrelatedly, they drift apart, Neil returning to india and then coming back to USA, running a taxi service. And then the FBI comes in, makes the three get back together and things change forever….


My Dad used the word taut while describing the film and its edited quite well, for sure, keeping it nice and tight, the story moving at all times. The camera angles are interesting and the first half is speckled with some good jokes, the most memorable being Neil’s “I’ve just come.” Followed by John’s “Really ? Bas gale milne se hi ?”. The three central characters act well. Neil was better than what I expected. Katrina, after a long while, got a role that required her to be more than just eye candy. John was as good as we would expect – fun in the party section and serious when he was needed to be.


It is a bit heavy though, and there are parts during the film where you wish you could watch in FF mode. The journey to the slightly predictable, mostly implausible end is not all fun and games and while not bad, is not brilliant either. In fact implausibility is writ large over a lot of the film, both major and minor, as the FBI would not have so many meetings with an informant in the open, a lot of the in-car shots showed the front car passenger without a seat belt etc


Kabir makes nice, thoughtful films. His first feature, Kabul Express, took a wry look at Afghanistan. This one focuses on USA’s response to 9/11 and I could kind of sense Kabir’s dilemma throughtout the film – I feel he thinks the USA did wrong, they’ve created more terrorists through their own actions etc. He tried to provide an ‘other side’ through Irrfan, the Muslim FBI agent, but he comes across as too trite, too flat. In the end, unfortunately, despite a few sparks and some good performances, even the film rises above mediocrity, but only just…

Mes Stars Et Moi

Rating : 7/10
Release Date : Oct ‘08
Time : 88 minutes
Director & Writer : Laetitia Colombani
Starring : Catherine Deneueve, Emmanuelle Beart, Kad Merad, Melanie Bernier, Rufus

A delightful movie, that engages you right from the start and leaves you wanting more. Imagine a movie fan who’s so lost in his world of stars that he ignores his family. Who would rather attend a movie premiere than meet his daughter. Who calls up bad reviewers and threatens them if they dare write something bad about his stars. Who stalks his stars and calls them up, amiably though, without ever scaring them. And who’s just obsessed, in a very real kind of way, without ever being psychotic or lunatic or even being ‘in love’ with them. Sounds plausible ?


Now take the stars – there’s actually three of them who are the objects of his affection. The senior, gracefully ageing Catherine, the beautiful Emmanuelle and the new starlet, a wide-eyed Melanie. Who decide they must do something about him. And do so in spectacular style…


The beauty of the film is that its kept very real and we feel for all the characters, including Kad, who is put through the wringer by the three gorgeous women. We feel for the stars as well, each one in different personal situations and affected differently by Kad’s obsession. Melanie, for example, has her TV audition cancelled as Kad calls up the TV Director, pretending to be her agent and lets him know that she would prefer to focus on cinema. And he tries to break up Emmanuelle’s affair with a rugby star as he feels he’s not right for her image.

There are two excellent cameo’s, one by the director / writer herself, as the psy-cat-analyst (for more on what that is, you’ll need to see the film) and another by Rufus, who plays Catherine’s friend cum driver cum housekeeper as dignifiedly as possible.


The pace of the film is great, something always happening. And the end is delicious, totally unexpected, showing leopards rarely change their spots...

Eastern Promises

Rating : 8/10
Release Date : Sep ‘07
Time : 100 minutes
Director : David Cronenborg ; Writer : Steven Knight ;
Starring : Viggo Mortensen, Naomi Watts, Armin Mueller-Stahl, Vincent Cassel
“Anna: Have you ever met a girl named Tatiana?
Nikolai Luzhin: I meet lot of girls named Tatiana.
Anna: She was pregnant.
Nikolai Luzhin: Ah, in that case - no, I've never heard of her.
Anna: She died on my shift.
Nikolai Luzhin: I thought you did birth?”

“Semyon: So, you know where I am...and now I know where you are, Anna Ivanovna”

“Nikolai Luzhin: Forget any of this happened. Stay away from people like me.”

A really, tight, tense film, which never lets up from the time it starts, beguiling you into its very authentic, violent, intimidating world. A world which seems to exist in parallel to the one we inhabit, a world with its own rules and own hierarchy.

This is a film about an English mid-wife, Anna’s (Naomi Watt) slow exposure to the Russian mafia. At first the characters seem charming, Semyon, with his restaurant, his borstch and violin playing skills, seems the epitome of graciousness. But then slowly, the blue eyes turn steely and then its too late for Anna to turn back. Semyon’s son Kirril (Vincent Cassil) is a bit too drunk, a bit too obsessed with girls and a bit too reliant on Nikolai (Viggo Mortensen), his driver. And the driver is, like the frozen wastelands of Russia, icy and restrained, almost emotionless.


Just to spice things up, there are some murderous Chechen’s, a Jewish barber who doubles as a hitman, Anna’s uncle who claims he used to work for the KGB and of course, there is Cristina, the baby who Tatiana died giving birth to…

Slowly, the film kind of comes together, things become clearer and the plot kind of assembles itself. What makes the film special though is the steady pace, the unrelenting tension, the attention to detail and the excellent performances. Viggo, Naomi and Armin, in particular, excel and epitomise their roles. The whole thing about tattoo’s, especially the Russian prison stories, are both chilling and interesting at the same time and provides a nice thread through the film. But it’s the tension which stays with you, even when it ends. Its gory in parts, graphic in others (despite the Indian DVD version seeming to have undergone several cuts) but never to a point where it becomes unwatchable.


There is another line in the film, where Nikolai asks Anna to go back to her world, where nice people belong, and he says it matter of factly, without emotion, without threatening and also without sadness. For me, that line encapsulates the film, underlining that there is a lot that is happening in reality which we don’t know about. And maybe we don’t want to.

Le Crime Est Notre Affaire

Rating : 7/10
Release Date : Oct ‘08
Time : 109 minutes
Director : Pascal Thomas ; Writer : Francois Caviglioli, inspired by Agatha Christie
Starring : Catherine Frot, Andre Dussollier, Claude Rich, Chiara Mastroianni, Hippolyte Girardot, Annie Cordy

Take a slightly looney aunt, who chases butterflies professionally. A bored housewife, who yearns for excitement after her husband's retirement from the police force. A villa, which is packed with crazy characters, each weirder than another. And finally take a murder that may have happened or not, depending on who you believe.



The concept, of witnessing a murder on a train passing by, is an age-old one, in this case copied from Agatha Christie’s ‘4.50 to Paddington’. However, what makes this film refreshingly different is that it decides to take the ‘tension plus fun’ angle instead of just ‘tension / murder mystery’. And we have to thank the lead characters, Catherine Frot and Andre Dussollier, for most of the fun, as they show the younger generation how to be romantic and live life kingsize, even when you’re retired.

From Catherine’s exotic mixing of music and food, her sudden love for snowshoes, her reaction when she walks back to her home and realises its ‘filled’ with noisy nephews to Andre’s struggle with his kilt, his reaction when he realises what lay behind her love for snowshoes and his several romantic efforts, there are enough comic moments throughout the film.

And given the creepy nature of the villa, aptly named ‘House of Wolves’, with several stuffed and sculpted specimens dotting the landscape and also the crazy inhabitants, including the incredibly stingy and screechy owner, Claude Rich, there are enough tension filled moments for those interested in the mystery part of the story. Nice film, taking a familiar concept and twisting it nicely, with enough thrills and spills to make it work well for fans of both comedies as well as mysteries…

8X10 Tasveer

Rating : 4/10
Release Date : 3rd April ‘09
Time : 125 minutes
Director & Writer : Nagesh Kukunoor ; Music : Bohemia, Neeraj Shridhar, Salim-Sulaiman
Starring : Akshay Kumar, Sharmila Tagore, Girish Karnad, Ayesha Takia, Anant Mahadevan, Rushad Rana, Benjamin Gilani

A very interesting premise, that of a man who can transport himself into a photograph and see things from the point of view of any of the characters in the photo, and a pretty good, tense build up amidst lovely landscape in Canada is almost scandalously spoilt by a terrible, illogical ending which leaves you wishing you could transport yourself back in time till before you entered the cinema hall.

Akshay is a rich kid who loves the environment so much that he works for the environmental protection agency (EPS) and is also estranged from his father, who is in the oil business, over the same issue. His father, unknown to Akshay, is about to hand over all his wealth to the EPS but dies just before he could do so. Was it an accidental death or was it murder ?And were any of the other persons on the yatch involved ? A very shifty looking uncle, Anant Mahadevan ? Or the mother, Sharmila ? Or the trusted friend and lawyer, Girish Karnad ? Or Akshay’s friend, Rushad, who looks too good to be true ? And just to add to the merriment there is an oddball detective, Javed Jaafri (who else ?) and Akshay’s girlfriend, Ayesha.


The first half is pretty good, keeps you engaged and builds up nicely, if you’re able to overlook such implausibilities as Akshay jumping off a 100ft cliff into a lake, which is so shallow that he can stand when he surfaces or a romantic song which ‘breaks’ the tension and kind of became a pre-intermission toilet break for most of the audience. Canada, as everyone knows, is beautiful and the camera showcases precisely that. I wish though, that I could reveal the end, as approx 30 minutes before the film ends, it starts to irrevocably go wrong. The twist was too predictable and also too implausible in the way it is developed. None of the characters is built up at all, including Akshay, who comes across too cold and too flat, kind of like Harbhajan bowling when he hasn’t yet taken a wicket (you guessed it…am fresh from watching the India- NZ Test match).


Its sad because this could’ve been great. It’s a very original and novel premise (am happy to be corrected, if anyone knows otherwise ?) and surely it deserved better. As it turns out, no one shines in this mess, except to a small degree, Canada.

Confessions of A Shopaholic

Rating : 4/10
Release Date : 13th Feb ‘09
Time : 104 minutes
Director : PJ Hogan; Writer : Tracey Jackson, Tim Firth, Kayla Alpert based on the novel by Sophie Kinsella; Music : James Newton Howard
Starring : Isla Fisher, Hugh Dancy, Krysten Ritter, John Lithgow, John Goodman, Joan Cusack, Kristin Scott Thomas, Leslie Bibb, Robert Stanton

It reminded me of Legally Blonde and Bridget Jones Diary, only it was slightly less funny, more corny / predictable and more vacuous (if that’s possible).


Shopaholic journalist, in search of her dream job in a fashion magazine, lands up working for a financial magazine instead, and begins to write a column which describes financial instruments using fashion metaphors (for example : A store credit card is like the cashmere dress you bought in a sale). She becomes very famous, the toast of the town and especially of cute boss, till her run-ins with her debt collector lead to things falling apart. Will she manage to come back on top ? Will she and cute boss get together or will he succumb to the wiles of her long legged competitor, Alicia, whose mere walk makes handbags pop open in a phallic reaction ? Will she eventually get the job in the fashion magazine ?


Most of the answers above are predictable as are most of the jokes – some innovations though – one was the whole tequila with bills concept, definitely worth trying, the other was the shopaholics anonymous idea, which has huge potential in the West I feel, and finally the frozen credit card, again a thought worth imitating in real life. However, the jokes which make you smile and the moments where you cringe at the sheer empty headedness of it all dead heat by the time the film ends. The financial metaphors she uses actually make sense but too little time is spent on that vs other sillier moments. Kristin Scott Thomas is wasted, especially with that fake French accent, John Goodman and Joan Cusack look haggard and Isla Fisher is decent but looks unnervingly like Elisabeth Shue. Hugh Dancy is probably the only one who comes out fine.


Most women in the audience, though, couldn’t stop giggling and seemed to enjoy the film. Treat it as a time-pass chick flick, take your wife/partner / girlfriend and earn major brownie points…

200th Review

BTW, have just realised that I've posted my 200th review...

I think its amazing how this has developed as I now find myself in a job which also is in the entertainment sector

Someone, in one of the comments or emails, commented that my average rating is very high - I dont seem to be discriminating enough / I seem to like most films. I think that observation is bang on. I hate being called a critic, am more a reviewer who posts his reviews because I like movies and I enjoy writing. My default rating is 5 and a movie has to do something bad for me to go lower. I feel my job is to point out what the film is about, what are the thoughts it made me feel and what were the good / bad points. If I do that well enough, it can help you decide whether to view the film yourself or not...

And the more films I watch, the more I'm enjoying it. I continue to have readers in over 250 cities across the 6 continents and this is still a great source of personal pride. Thanks to everyone for your feedback / comments / support, hope it continues.

Apurv

Little Zizou

Rating : 7/10
Release Date : 20th Mar ‘09
Time : 101 minutes
Director & Writer : Sooni Taraporevala; Music : Bickram Ghosh
Starring : Jahan Batlivala, Imaad Shah, Boman Irani, Zenobia Shroff, Shernaz Patel, Sohrab Ardeshir, Kurush Deboo, Dilshad Patel, John Abraham, Cyrus Barocha, Kamal Sidhu, Tknow Francorsi, Mahabanoo Mody-Kotwal, Iyanah Bativala

I love the way comic book illustrations, as seen through the eyes of one of its main protagonists, Imaad Shah, consistently merge in and out of the film. I loved the way the Russians invaded Parsi-land in the opening sequence. I loved the way each character is totally immersed in his/her own world – be it preparing for a new world order, running a small newspaper or building a 747 simulator. And I loved most of all the little eccentricities shown, the kookiness of this sect, kind of the way Parsi’s are stereotyped to be, their own language, their own sayings. And it extends to way beyond the silly shallow ‘eh dikra’ and the dresses most Hindi films have shown so far. And given the reaction of a few Parsi’s sitting near my wife as she watched the film, who were cracking up constantly during the film, this one seems to have hit an authentic sweet spot…


The movie is narrated through Jahan’s eyes, a kid who’s obsessed with Zinedine Zidane (hence the nickname) and football, which he plays either in real life or on his brothers laptop or in cybercafe’s (hilarious scene where he’s playing it sandwiched between two guys surfing porn who keep requesting him to lower the volume as they cant concentrate…). He’s also obsessed with the thought of whether his mother (who died during childbirth) saw him or not and whether she continues to watch over him or not. He’s also rarely in school and milks the fact that he doesn’t have a mom with some kind neighbours, much to consternation of the neighbours daughter.


Jahan’s elder brother, Imaad, the comic book illustrator, is a pretty chilled guy, who cares for his kid brother in a non-intrusive, non-possessive way. And its his obsession to make a 747 simulator, along with two other crazy guys, one of whom is always eating and the other, who is a half Russian / half Parsi, ‘lovingly’ called half baked lemon soda by one member of the fanatical force run by his Dad. Jahan’s and Imaad’s father, Sohrab Ardeshir as Khodaiji II, is probably one of the craziest of the lot, fancying himself to be the next messiah, doing chanting, exhorting his force to spread the word, more blunder than buss and with a devoted secretary (Shernaz Patel), who drinks on the sly, but then as Jahan points out, his father could drive anybody to drink.

Khodaiji’s arch enemy is the full of life Boman Presswala (Boman Irani), who is also the neighbour giving solace to the two kids. His wife Roxanne (Zenobia) is a loving, maternal woman, their house is full of music and love and laughter, and they have two daughters – the elder one is an object of affection for Imaad, while the younger one resents the attention Jahan gets from Zenobia and enjoys putting her little nose in everything. When trouble hits them, with the battle between Khodaiji and Boman intensifying as Boman exposes the nonsense that the group is upto, then its Zenobia who has to try and sort things out with her mom, a Mrs Havisham style character excellently played by Mahabanoo Mody-Kotwal.


I can go on and on about the characters, they’re reasonably well fleshed out and they’re fun to get to know. I can go on about the jokes – there’s one a minute – ‘meet Yassir, he’s thin so the opposite of Yassir Ara’fat’’ and even Imaad’s hilarious password for his laptop. Or Jahan’s character descriptions – ‘she was one of those people who hated people but loved animals’. Or the whole ‘PLO : We want you’ ripoff of the Uncle Sam stuff. And the music is lovely, in one sequence Indian classical music is amazingly synched with a football game and in others it provides a little energy to the characters being shown. And, finally, the comic illustrations by Sarnath Banerjee were brilliant – the ones about the Russians, Kamal Siddhu and John Abraham will linger in memory for a while !

Its sweet, its funny, a little bittersweet in parts. As Boman Presswala says in a speech during the film, “these three boys had a crazy dream. Its good to be crazy sometimes and its always good to dream”. I have a feeling this crazy little film is Sooni Taraporevala’s dream and it made for an engaging watch on the big screen…

Firaaq

Rating : 7/10
Release Date : 20th Mar ‘09
Time : 101 minutes
Director & Co-writer : Nandita Das; Co-Writer : Shuchi Kothari; Music : Rajat Dholakia, Piyush Kanojia
Starring : Shahana Goswami, Naseeruddin Shah, Tisca Chopra, Deepti Naval, Paresh Rawal, Sanjay Suri, Raghuvir Yadav, Mohammad Samad

Firaaq, as its opening screen says, is a work of fiction, inspired by a thousand true stories.

Rather than focus on the actual riots (the Hindu-Muslim carnage in Gujarat in 2002), it depicts, sometimes in gruesome detail, the impact & aftermath approx one month later on different people across all income classes. It shows how very few people are left unscarred, how one woman (Shahana Goswami) begins to view her best friend with suspicion. How a middle class housewife (Deepti Naval) is haunted by her failure to give sanctuary to someone fleeing from a mob.


How a ‘mixed’ couple (Tisca Chopra as the Hindu wife and Sanjay Suri as the Muslim husband) is packing up and leaving for Delhi after their store is ransacked during the violence. How a handful of Muslims are plotting revenge. How an elderly Muslim music teacher (Naseeruddin Shah) is shielded from the horrors happening around him by his faithful servant (Raghuvir Yadav), but then reality slowly dawns on him. How the entire state / govt machinery seems to be anti-Muslim during this period. And how a young, endearing Muslim boy (Mohammad Samad in a heart rending performance), with his big innocent eyes, has seen more horrors in two months than we would wish anyone, young or old, to have seen in a whole lifetime.

I sometimes also wonder why only such films, which showcase violence or poverty or project an unflattering view of India are the ones which win awards in foreign festivals ? But then, as I walk the streets of Kolkotta from one pub to another, where the average price of a pint of beer is higher than what 800 million of my fellow country men earn in a day, and I see the signs of poverty all around me (people sleeping on the streets, pulling rickshaws, bathing on the pavement or in filthy pools etc), I realize maybe these are the films which, unlike the glam world of Bollywood, actually represent the true India, and the world I live in is the superficial one.
After all, which is the city in India which can claim to never have suffered from communal violence ? Or not have very poor people within its limits ? And as over-educated, born-with-a-silver-spoon, idiots like Varun Gandhi have demonstrated recently, this has still not stopped political parties from attempting to whip up communal frenzy / hatred.

I guess we should be glad that our media is free, that we are allowed to create, air and view such films. I sometimes wonder what is the point of such films ? But then maybe that is the point of such films, to simply remind us that there is a point, that if it can make even one person reject this cycle of communal hatred, religiously cultivated (pun intended) by political parties for narrow minded short term gains, then its worth it.

Barah Aana

Rating : 7/10
Release Date : 20th Mar ‘09
Time : 97 minutes
Director & Co-writer : Raja Menon; Co-Writer : Raj Kumar Gupta: Music : Shri
Starring : Arjun Mathur, Naseeruddin Shah, Vijay Raaz, Violante Placido, Benjamin Gilani, Jayati Bhatia, Tannishtha Chatterjee
A strange friendship between a waiter (Arjun Mathur), a security guard (Vijay Raaz) and a driver (Naseeruddin Shah), all of whom live in a sprawling slum and have very different motives in life, is the focus of this film

Arjun dreams of a better life, dreams of a foreigner who is friendly with him in the coffee shop he waits in and thus ignores the outspoken affections of Tannishtha, who lives in the same slum and is his landlord’s daughter.

Naseeruddin Shah has been hard done by his family members and now is content to while his days away in silence, rarely speaking, even when the mistress of the house he drives for, hurls unprompted & unjustified abuse at him. He is happy to be amongst the world’s living dead, pun intended.


The show stealer of the film is Vijay Raaz, who is underconfident, bumbling, a bit of an idiot, struggling to make ends meet and is trying desperately to make sure he is able to send to his village the Rs 5000 needed to make his son alright. One slap, though, changes all this and its lovely to watch the ‘new’ Vijay Raaz, authoritative, full of beans and how this rubs off on his cohorts. And how the three of them cope with the twists and turns that life throws at them

Contrary to what some rich people like to believe, the poor still do find ways to have fun, so there are plenty of light hearted moments. Even some of the tragic moments are shown in a ‘funny’ way, Vijay Raaz again coming to the fore. Either when he is being made to climb up and down three stories in a power struggle between the self-important secretary of the society and the unrepentant owner of an wrongly parked car or when he bemoans the lack of humanity amongst the society dwellers and their inability to lend him the money he needs for his son’s medicines, despite their spending more on necessities like pizza’s etc and despite his having gone out of the way to care for some of them in their hour of need.


The film moves along at a nice clip, has enough sub-plots to keep you interested and they all come together neatly and tie up towards the end. It is full of little insights – someone has observed with minute detail how most of us mistreat, abuse and humiliate our servants on a routine basis, the kind of non-issues we blow up to find a reason to perhaps vent our frustrations on these helpless souls who usually have nowhere to go. And I think, the fact that this film gets this message through without making moralizing or preaching, and still makes sure you leave the movie hall chuckling, is what makes this a very good film…