I'm an American that's been living in India for four months. KANK is the only Hindi movie I've seen with subtitles (that is, where I've known what's going on). I liked it. It was definitely a bit melodramatic and cheesy, but I've come to expect that from Indian cinema. Relative to US movies, I would rate it as a pretty run-of-the-mill, cheesy drama/chick-flick.
I've seen a lot of responses to the movie that are really negative, saying the story didn't make sense or the characters didn't make sense, and I don't really understand what they're talking about. I would say the characters were relatively well-formed. They were consistent, and although they didn't necessarily have a full depth, it was easy as a viewer to fill the gaps, to imagine the kind of person they were. An example of this is the tension in both marriages. The tension and the reasons for it were well-established, and that gave insight into the characters' personalities. I was surprised by how decent the acting was (decent, but not great). Compared to what I've seen on TV and movie clips here, the acting in KANK was far more realistic. It was hard to believe Maya sometimes under all the makeup, but I thought she did a pretty good job beneath that mask.
The story wasn't bad. It had a lot of pretty extreme (but predictable) coincidences, but I applaud their creativity in coming up with so many ways to prolong the problem. Speaking of which, this movie was very, very long. If it was a US movie, it could have ended right after the intermission - they love each other, get together, bam, it's over. The song and dance numbers were not something I'm used to (well, there's Moulin Rouge, Chicago, and The Producers, but I'm not used Hindi song and dance numbers). However, I had heard the songs played all the time here, and it was cool to see how they fit into the movie, and what they really were about.
Comments I've seen about how it glorifies adultery and such are hogwash. It's a story about people. People aren't perfect. These things happen, and drama is about reflecting real life. Go watch Sideways or Crash to understand how flawed people can be the subject of a movie. As I said, relative to US movies, I would rate it as a pretty run-of-the-mill, cheesy drama/chick-flick. However, I give it a 7/10 (higher than I would a US movie of this quality) because I think it's a Hindi film worth a viewing, at the very least to understand a little bit of the culture here.
I've seen a lot of responses to the movie that are really negative, saying the story didn't make sense or the characters didn't make sense, and I don't really understand what they're talking about. I would say the characters were relatively well-formed. They were consistent, and although they didn't necessarily have a full depth, it was easy as a viewer to fill the gaps, to imagine the kind of person they were. An example of this is the tension in both marriages. The tension and the reasons for it were well-established, and that gave insight into the characters' personalities. I was surprised by how decent the acting was (decent, but not great). Compared to what I've seen on TV and movie clips here, the acting in KANK was far more realistic. It was hard to believe Maya sometimes under all the makeup, but I thought she did a pretty good job beneath that mask.
The story wasn't bad. It had a lot of pretty extreme (but predictable) coincidences, but I applaud their creativity in coming up with so many ways to prolong the problem. Speaking of which, this movie was very, very long. If it was a US movie, it could have ended right after the intermission - they love each other, get together, bam, it's over. The song and dance numbers were not something I'm used to (well, there's Moulin Rouge, Chicago, and The Producers, but I'm not used Hindi song and dance numbers). However, I had heard the songs played all the time here, and it was cool to see how they fit into the movie, and what they really were about.
Comments I've seen about how it glorifies adultery and such are hogwash. It's a story about people. People aren't perfect. These things happen, and drama is about reflecting real life. Go watch Sideways or Crash to understand how flawed people can be the subject of a movie. As I said, relative to US movies, I would rate it as a pretty run-of-the-mill, cheesy drama/chick-flick. However, I give it a 7/10 (higher than I would a US movie of this quality) because I think it's a Hindi film worth a viewing, at the very least to understand a little bit of the culture here.