DASVIDANIYA : Go, Live your Life !
The first step in the spiritual process is to understand death, look at it as a fact of life and the only certainty in life. With this understanding, you then look at life in a completely different paradigm. It can completely change your perspective of how you are living and how insignificant things are making you miserable. And at the same time, how seemingly simple things can bring joy in your life and make you actually live your life.
Dasvidaniya takes this concept as the basic premise of its theme. Amar Koul (Vinay Pathak) is the main protagonist of the movie, who is an eternal looser personified. His life is completely dry, colorless, uninspiring and without anything actually happening. He is 37 and still single, since he could never confess his love to the girl with whom he grew up. He is a looser at work being constantly harassed by his boss. He doesn’t have any friend and family. The only family he has is his mother, who seemingly is more interested in Saas Bahu TV Serials than anything else in life. He has a brother, with whom he has not spoken since last seven years. The only exciting thing for him to do, is to make his daily “Things to do” list, which contains the daily mundane chores, like repairing the geyser, paying insurance bills etc etc.
In the middle of this unexciting life, he discovers that he is in the terminal stage of his stomach cancer and the doctor gives him only three months more to live. Once this revelation sinks in him, he starts making an insight into his life or the lack of it and does some self talk to reflect how he actually has stopped living many years ago. That is when he makes his final things to do list. “The things to do before I die.” At this point, we all can actually relate to this “things to do list”, as most of us will have the similar list and similar desires … to get the things that we want, car/house etc, to have a job we love, to be popular, to get the love of our life, to have family and friends around us. He makes a list of ten such things. The things which normally would have been impossible for him to do or achieve, had he continued to live the way he was living. However in the face of death, he manages to achieve all of this in just three months.
Dasvidaniya, carries this seemingly simple story line with honesty and sincerity.
The story by Arshad Sayed and screenplay is breezy and does not let the movie to lag or slow down at all. The characterization is authentic and look like coming directly from the real life.
The performances from the team of Dasvidaniya, which is now a popular gang after movies like “Beja Fry” and “Mithya” is simply too good. Vinay Pathak continues his simpleton character from Beja Fry and adds a pinch of sensitivity to it, making it lovable. Rajat Kapor as Vinay’s friend and Gaurav Gera as Vinay’s brother, both have played this role with finesse and ease. Neha Dupiya seems to have a new parallel cinema career going on, giving one more realistic performance after Mithya. Saurabh Shukla, playing Vinay’s boss, plays the typical, “we hate you boss” personified!
However Sarita Joshi, as Vinya’s mother stands out in her performance. Sarita is a very renowned actor from marathi theater. Her performance demonstrates the acting capability of theater artists. She has played her role with great authenticity and ease.
Not to be left out of the gang, Ranvir Shorey has also a small cameo in the movie. However I don’t think the role did justice to Ranvir’s capabilities.
The music and the background scores of Dasvidaniya is also one of its high points. We see Kailash Kher playing the role of a lyricist and music director along with the lead singer. He has written very simple but pleasing lyrics and given some soothing music, which is very atypical of kailash, whom we normally associate with high pitched Sufi style music. The “mumma” song is reminiscent of Prasoon Joshi’s “Ma” song from “Tare Zameen Par”.
On a whole, Dasvidaniya is a very honest movie, which will make you emote with it. A very rare thing from a normal bollywood movie. Full marks to debutant director Shashant Shah and the producers Azam Khan and Vinya (who is the co-producer) for choosing such a script, which gives you a simple but most essential message of life.
The message from Dasvidaniya is - we do not consider that even though our death may not be three months from now, but it is going to be there, in three years or thirty years or maybe more, but it is going to be there. So what are we waiting for to actually live our life the way we want to. Let us get stated and live our life!
Ameet Mattoo
New Delhi.
Monday, November 24, 2008
Monday, November 17, 2008
MOVIE REVIEW : DOSTANA
Hot Bodies, No Brains – Missed Opportunity.
For debutant director Tarun Mansukhani, it is a clear case of missed opportunity!
Dostana, even before it’s release, got instant popularity because of it’s banner and the name of Karan Johar, who is synonymous to - real emotional new age hindi cinema, with movies like Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna and Kuch Kuch Hota hai. Dostana can also claim to be first hindi movie which showcases the best bodies in the industry. Priyanka Chopra is looking awesome and stunning and John Abraham is looking like a Greek God – a true embodiment of Adonis, look stunning and hot. To top it, there are some real cool locations of Miami, where these people, in their short clothes, completely jell in the settings. Dostana has got a lot of visual appeal as well as cool music to go with it, which would make anyone, who has seen the promos, to go for the movie.
However that is where the good part ends. The script is very vague and the story telling immature. Tarun should know that good visual appeal and good music is good to make a nice promo for the movie; however for the entire movie to sustain you need something more …. a meaningful script and some good direction. Both are missing in Dostana. A great opportunity to make a real nice pleasant movie has been lost by Tarun. I just wonder, if Karan Johar was not involved in the making of this movie?
Dostana seemingly has a simple story line of two tricky but lovable guys eyeing the same thing. In this case, it is the pretty lass Priyanka. Similar situation has been depicted many times in hindi movies and there are two major ways of handling such story … one through humor and other through the classical emotional way. We have had great movies in the past, like the 70s classic “Dau aur dau paanch” who handled such a story in a very humorous way. And there have been umpteen movies, who have handled such a story the emotional way.
Tarun is not sure which one to use and that is the biggest problem with Dostana. Tarun juggles to handle the story using both humor and emotions and fails miserably in both. He starts in a humorous way, but there are hardly any pranks the two guys play on each other to get the girl. In fact there is just one prank which John plays on Abhishek where he gets him “woman”-handled by a bunch of Aunties. When Abhishek is back from the “assault”, it looks funny, however that is not how Abhishek actually feels. He seems to be actually hurt and sentimental and even slaps John for the same and the movie seems to take an emotional turn here … but then Abhishek suddenly seems to forget all his pain and he is shown jolly, soon again. Quite an emotional yo-yo! Taurn tries very hard to juggle to make Dostana full of fun, emotion and happy go lucky feel and somehow gets lost in between.
Dostana can also claim to effectively use vulgar expressions and dialogues and disguise it as humor. Looks like it got un-noticed by censor board and probably they believed that being a Karan Johar movie, it could not be vulgar. There is no reason the movie should not get an “A” Certificate. It is quite astonishing that Madhur Bhandarkar had to really struggle even to get an “A” certificate and Dostana managed a “U/A” certificate. Dostana will be taking our acceptable social fabric to next level, making Gay jokes popular, even with kids.
In terms of acting, Priyanka is really cool and has given an effervescent performance even better than her recent Fashion, where she seemed to be burdened by the seriousness and reality of the movie. Here she looks, cool charming and confident of her self and her body. We all know how sexy John looks in his mischievous smile. However he can not carry the entire movie with this single look of his. He needs to emote and act aswell, which we know he can, however looks like he forgot to do it. Abhishek seems to be completely lost in the movie. He is not sure if he has to act and look funny or emotional or sad or what? He definitely needs to hire an acting consultant to manage his looks and emotions, especially when the director does not know how to manage it. (case in point Goldie Bahl in Drona and now Tarun). One actually ends up having pity on Abhishek, who is such a potential as an actor and is getting wasted in movies like Dostana, Drona, Mission Istanbul, etc. Kiron Kher is repeating her Punjabi mother act, which seems to be getting overused - since we saw her in Singh is King, Om Shanti Om, Rang de Basanti, etc. It is no more funny and she actually ends up hamming. Boman Irani has done justice to his very small role. Lastly it was good to see Bobby Deol trying to act. He however is not able to hide his aging and seems quite unfit in the company of Abhishek, John and Priyanka – maybe it was intended that way !
Music of Dostana is quite catchy. Some of the tunes are quite hum-able especially Jane Kyon song. Vishal and Shekhar, who are having a good run since a couple of years, have done a pretty good job. Though some of the songs, like Ma da Ladla, are too much in your face and screechy.
On a whole, Dostana had all the right ingredients v.i.z - actors, bodies, locales, music, cinematography and budget to make a fine movie and for Taurn to make a strong debutant impact, but Alas, like many other such high potential movies, Dostana also falls flat and leaves the audience with emptiness and bitterness on how such potential was wasted. The saving grace though is that the young audience might have a good time enjoying the crass humor.
Ameet Mattoo
New Delhi
For debutant director Tarun Mansukhani, it is a clear case of missed opportunity!
Dostana, even before it’s release, got instant popularity because of it’s banner and the name of Karan Johar, who is synonymous to - real emotional new age hindi cinema, with movies like Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna and Kuch Kuch Hota hai. Dostana can also claim to be first hindi movie which showcases the best bodies in the industry. Priyanka Chopra is looking awesome and stunning and John Abraham is looking like a Greek God – a true embodiment of Adonis, look stunning and hot. To top it, there are some real cool locations of Miami, where these people, in their short clothes, completely jell in the settings. Dostana has got a lot of visual appeal as well as cool music to go with it, which would make anyone, who has seen the promos, to go for the movie.
However that is where the good part ends. The script is very vague and the story telling immature. Tarun should know that good visual appeal and good music is good to make a nice promo for the movie; however for the entire movie to sustain you need something more …. a meaningful script and some good direction. Both are missing in Dostana. A great opportunity to make a real nice pleasant movie has been lost by Tarun. I just wonder, if Karan Johar was not involved in the making of this movie?
Dostana seemingly has a simple story line of two tricky but lovable guys eyeing the same thing. In this case, it is the pretty lass Priyanka. Similar situation has been depicted many times in hindi movies and there are two major ways of handling such story … one through humor and other through the classical emotional way. We have had great movies in the past, like the 70s classic “Dau aur dau paanch” who handled such a story in a very humorous way. And there have been umpteen movies, who have handled such a story the emotional way.
Tarun is not sure which one to use and that is the biggest problem with Dostana. Tarun juggles to handle the story using both humor and emotions and fails miserably in both. He starts in a humorous way, but there are hardly any pranks the two guys play on each other to get the girl. In fact there is just one prank which John plays on Abhishek where he gets him “woman”-handled by a bunch of Aunties. When Abhishek is back from the “assault”, it looks funny, however that is not how Abhishek actually feels. He seems to be actually hurt and sentimental and even slaps John for the same and the movie seems to take an emotional turn here … but then Abhishek suddenly seems to forget all his pain and he is shown jolly, soon again. Quite an emotional yo-yo! Taurn tries very hard to juggle to make Dostana full of fun, emotion and happy go lucky feel and somehow gets lost in between.
Dostana can also claim to effectively use vulgar expressions and dialogues and disguise it as humor. Looks like it got un-noticed by censor board and probably they believed that being a Karan Johar movie, it could not be vulgar. There is no reason the movie should not get an “A” Certificate. It is quite astonishing that Madhur Bhandarkar had to really struggle even to get an “A” certificate and Dostana managed a “U/A” certificate. Dostana will be taking our acceptable social fabric to next level, making Gay jokes popular, even with kids.
In terms of acting, Priyanka is really cool and has given an effervescent performance even better than her recent Fashion, where she seemed to be burdened by the seriousness and reality of the movie. Here she looks, cool charming and confident of her self and her body. We all know how sexy John looks in his mischievous smile. However he can not carry the entire movie with this single look of his. He needs to emote and act aswell, which we know he can, however looks like he forgot to do it. Abhishek seems to be completely lost in the movie. He is not sure if he has to act and look funny or emotional or sad or what? He definitely needs to hire an acting consultant to manage his looks and emotions, especially when the director does not know how to manage it. (case in point Goldie Bahl in Drona and now Tarun). One actually ends up having pity on Abhishek, who is such a potential as an actor and is getting wasted in movies like Dostana, Drona, Mission Istanbul, etc. Kiron Kher is repeating her Punjabi mother act, which seems to be getting overused - since we saw her in Singh is King, Om Shanti Om, Rang de Basanti, etc. It is no more funny and she actually ends up hamming. Boman Irani has done justice to his very small role. Lastly it was good to see Bobby Deol trying to act. He however is not able to hide his aging and seems quite unfit in the company of Abhishek, John and Priyanka – maybe it was intended that way !
Music of Dostana is quite catchy. Some of the tunes are quite hum-able especially Jane Kyon song. Vishal and Shekhar, who are having a good run since a couple of years, have done a pretty good job. Though some of the songs, like Ma da Ladla, are too much in your face and screechy.
On a whole, Dostana had all the right ingredients v.i.z - actors, bodies, locales, music, cinematography and budget to make a fine movie and for Taurn to make a strong debutant impact, but Alas, like many other such high potential movies, Dostana also falls flat and leaves the audience with emptiness and bitterness on how such potential was wasted. The saving grace though is that the young audience might have a good time enjoying the crass humor.
Ameet Mattoo
New Delhi
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
MOVIE REVIEW : FASHION
FASHION : Reality sans Drama !
Madhur Bhandarkar's name has become synonymous with realistic cinema. Cinema which is far from melodrama, cinema which touches the reality around us, cinema which explores the under-belly of situations in real life around us. There is no doubt about the quality of cinema which Madhur makes. However, one big challenge for such kind of realistic cinema, which is similar to the "Art Movies" of the past decades, is to connect to the audience at large.
Madhur, with much acclaimed cinema like Chandani Bar and Satta, could only impact the niche audience, gather acclaim in the Festival circuits and also win Laurels in the form of National Awards. These movies however could not have much commercial success, neither could they fit the bill to be called an entertaining cinema. This however was very well understood by Madhur and the this connect was made with movies like Page3 and Corporate, which were not just realistic movies but entertaining aswell and garnered commercial success, seamlessly bridging the gap of "Art Cinema" and "Mainstream" one.
Madhur however seems to forget this very important aspect over and over again. He did the same in Traffic Signal and now he repeats the act in Fashion.
Fashion is no doubt a nice movie showing the realistic aspect of the Fashion World. It reveals the not so hidden underbelly of an industry which is low on moral, low ethics and full of opportunism and short terms successes.
However it lacks any kind of Drama, which is essential to make the movie entertaining. One is not even able to relate to the main protagonist, Meghna Mathur(Priyanka Chopra). Even though the scripts nicely traces the rise and fall of the small town girl from Chandigarh, who is high on ambition and gives up all her middle class values to attain success, and in the process leaves behind a trail of sour relationships and lost friends. And finally is not able to handle success and ends up as a soul less girl completely engulfed in depression.
But at no point you are with her. Neither as a naïve girl, in her struggle in Mumbai, which ends up looking too simplistic and easy. Nor in her success where she develops arrogance and get completely engulfed and intoxicated with it. And not even in her depression, where she looses everything.
The quality of good cinema is not just to show the changing and grey shaded of human behavior but also the ability to make audience empathize with the characters, where people are able to relate to the characters and find a little bit of themselves in the character. And this is where Madhur completely falters.
He takes his realistic cinema image too seriously and takes all other aspect of movie making for-granted. His indulgence with realism is extreme. The ramp scenes are inordinately long. The low on moral models, the opportunistic men, the gay designers, the wardrobe malfunctions, drugs ... it all seems like, been there done that and is reminiscent of things we have already seen in movies like Page3 and all the ubiquitous News channels.
In all the "realism" that Fashion tries to discover, there seems to be no new-ness and everything is so predictable. And to make the matters worse, there is nothing else to hold the attention of the Audience. What starts as a quite encouraging movie, ends up as a very long lifeless documentary. Probably editing the movie to cut the flab by 30 to 45mins might have added some life in it.
On a whole, Fashion is one more realistic attempt by Madhur Bandarkar, which does not discover anything new and ends up as a long, lifeless, tiring movie. Watch it for, interesting though clichéd performance by Kangana Ranaut, debutant but confident Mugdha Godse and the effervescent performance by Arbaaz Khan.
Ameet Mattoo
New Delhi.
Madhur Bhandarkar's name has become synonymous with realistic cinema. Cinema which is far from melodrama, cinema which touches the reality around us, cinema which explores the under-belly of situations in real life around us. There is no doubt about the quality of cinema which Madhur makes. However, one big challenge for such kind of realistic cinema, which is similar to the "Art Movies" of the past decades, is to connect to the audience at large.
Madhur, with much acclaimed cinema like Chandani Bar and Satta, could only impact the niche audience, gather acclaim in the Festival circuits and also win Laurels in the form of National Awards. These movies however could not have much commercial success, neither could they fit the bill to be called an entertaining cinema. This however was very well understood by Madhur and the this connect was made with movies like Page3 and Corporate, which were not just realistic movies but entertaining aswell and garnered commercial success, seamlessly bridging the gap of "Art Cinema" and "Mainstream" one.
Madhur however seems to forget this very important aspect over and over again. He did the same in Traffic Signal and now he repeats the act in Fashion.
Fashion is no doubt a nice movie showing the realistic aspect of the Fashion World. It reveals the not so hidden underbelly of an industry which is low on moral, low ethics and full of opportunism and short terms successes.
However it lacks any kind of Drama, which is essential to make the movie entertaining. One is not even able to relate to the main protagonist, Meghna Mathur(Priyanka Chopra). Even though the scripts nicely traces the rise and fall of the small town girl from Chandigarh, who is high on ambition and gives up all her middle class values to attain success, and in the process leaves behind a trail of sour relationships and lost friends. And finally is not able to handle success and ends up as a soul less girl completely engulfed in depression.
But at no point you are with her. Neither as a naïve girl, in her struggle in Mumbai, which ends up looking too simplistic and easy. Nor in her success where she develops arrogance and get completely engulfed and intoxicated with it. And not even in her depression, where she looses everything.
The quality of good cinema is not just to show the changing and grey shaded of human behavior but also the ability to make audience empathize with the characters, where people are able to relate to the characters and find a little bit of themselves in the character. And this is where Madhur completely falters.
He takes his realistic cinema image too seriously and takes all other aspect of movie making for-granted. His indulgence with realism is extreme. The ramp scenes are inordinately long. The low on moral models, the opportunistic men, the gay designers, the wardrobe malfunctions, drugs ... it all seems like, been there done that and is reminiscent of things we have already seen in movies like Page3 and all the ubiquitous News channels.
In all the "realism" that Fashion tries to discover, there seems to be no new-ness and everything is so predictable. And to make the matters worse, there is nothing else to hold the attention of the Audience. What starts as a quite encouraging movie, ends up as a very long lifeless documentary. Probably editing the movie to cut the flab by 30 to 45mins might have added some life in it.
On a whole, Fashion is one more realistic attempt by Madhur Bandarkar, which does not discover anything new and ends up as a long, lifeless, tiring movie. Watch it for, interesting though clichéd performance by Kangana Ranaut, debutant but confident Mugdha Godse and the effervescent performance by Arbaaz Khan.
Ameet Mattoo
New Delhi.
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