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Reviews
Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna (2006)
Kabhi Alvida Toh Kehna
Having taken away the only thing Shahrukh truly adds to a movie (chemistry and truly awesome necking sequences), Karan Johar instead tries to make him act (bad idea).
KANK is SRK at his hamming best (reminds one of his role in Hum Tumhare Hai Sanam, where he's actually done a pretty decent job, in KANK it stands out like a sore thumb), Rani at her howling best, and Preity at her disco best.
Not a patch on Yash Chopra's extra-marital hit Silsila. Not even a patch on Karan Johar's own Kal Ho Na Ho as far as using the dynamism of New York to its best advantage.
The only things that worked - Amitabh Bachchan, Abhishek Bachchan, Kirron Kher and the music. The songs are catchy and stick in your head. Especially Mitwa.
Entertaining in parts, it will make you laugh a lot, and make some of you cry even. Watch it if your expectations from films are pretty low.
More on other movies: http://pgthirteen.blogspot.com
The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
Peter Jackson should have made Harry Potter
Yes, this is a review for Lord of the Rings. And the above statement will start to make sense soon enough.
Tolkien, perhaps overcome by the sheer enormity of what he created was tempted to ramble. The book began as an outlet for a new language he had invented, but ended in an epic of humungous proportions.
The book LOTR is a rambling road trip full of the most amazing incidents imaginable. He follows a million parallel stories, draws references from a zillion places and occurrences that happen simultaneously in his story.
While that in itself maybe great for the writer and the reader, it's a terror for a director. Much like IMDB itself where a zillion threads are cross-indexed to the last known source, LOTR the book had too many stories that were interesting. To pick out the main ones, to link them together with no holes, to bind them into hours (when Tolkien's time frames were in months and years) was a hard ask.
Someone I know once said to me, " If you haven't read the book, the movie's great. If you've read the book, it's brilliant."
It's rare that one gets to see such an evolved and involved production of a book. That so much respect has been accorded to the author, without pandering to every word that he has written.
Peter Jackson has been brilliant in his understanding of Tolkien, in fact, he has added dimensions to the movie that the book left unsaid. The characters have been fleshed out very well, middle earth is very believable and time frames have been handled with finesse. It is a labour of love and that adds an element of sincerity to the performances, to the sets, to the details.
And the reason why this review is more about Peter Jackson than any other aspect of the movie is that LOTR is Peter Jackson. Every bit of it has his contributions, his hard work reflected in it. He's the reason a million people are waiting a whole year to watch 'The Two Towers'.
Some famous dude, don't remember his name, also said that 'anyone can make a good Harry Potter film.' Those who've seen the movie and more importantly those who've read the book will agree, it didn't work any magic.
You watch the movies and you prefer JK Rowling versions of things. And the director doesn't seem to have contributed a whole lot more to the vision.
To translate someone's vision into real life images and pictures, to stay true to what a million people had thought it would be like, to surpass their imagination, to make it come to life takes passion. And that's a virtue Peter Jackson had plenty of. And guess Potter director Chris Columbus didn't.
Sliding Doors (1998)
Sliding doors. One opens. One shuts.
Peter Howitt explores the concept of parallel lives with amazing dexterity and simplicity. He uses wit and movement and most importantly silence to convey two stories. Which at first appear to be diametrically opposed to each other, and then take quite another turn.
What with crystal balls and tarot cards, we've always longed to know what the future will be like. What would have happened if we hadn't made the decisions we made. An author once said that we choose the life we want to lead. So even though we might suffer innumerable 'why me's', it's just possible that this life we are leading was in fact the best of the lot.
Like Gwyneth's is in Sliding Doors. The device of 'what if' has been used often. But Peter makes it look seamless and very believable. She goes through two lives in the span of this movie. And just when you begin to empathise with one aspect of her life, with the one story that seems to be going well for her, suddenly the other takes a different turn. And you think that maybe it was all for the best after all.
John Hannah (Four weddings and a Funeral, The Mummy) and Gwyneth Paltrow have put in splendid performance. Paltrow in particular has explored a myriad set of moods and has carried off every one of them. Though her English accent does fail at times. Then there's this character Russell played by Douglas McFerran who is just too funny. Jeanne Tripplehorn and John Lynch have also put in good performances.
The soundtrack also includes Dido's 'Thank You'.
Dil Chahta Hai (2001)
Indian cinema needed a 'Dil Chahta Hai
Indian cinema needed a 'Dil Chahta Hai'. Desperately. The movies were losing younger audiences to TV and bowling alleys. Also Hindi film writers seemed to have nothing new to add.
And then here came a film, a decidedly simple film, about three friends - and it changed everything. The youngsters loved the film. They identified with the cast, the clothes, the haircuts, the songs, the emotions, the dances and the humour. It wasn't obvious, it wasn't repetitive, it didn't insult their intelligence. It spoke their language.
In fact, DCH was one film where even the actors got a new lease of life. With hip haircuts and cool gear, the cast looked fab.
Farhan Akhtar the director (whose father Javed Akhtar created the angry young Amitabh Bachchan), had made his point. This was a Hindi movie, with all the curry to suit the Indian palate, but it was served just right.
Watch this movie for its attitude and its energy. Its youthfulness and its never say die attitude. That's what it's all about.
Strane storie (Racconti di fine secolo) (1994)
my comments on 'strange stories'
'Strange stories' is nowhere close to being a horror flick. But what struck me about the movie was the fear it put into me. The situations were bizarre, but the emotions were very real. They were emotions that you and I feel on a day to day basis. Desperation. Hate. Desire. Loneliness. Anger. At any given point in the movie, any one of us could have been the protagonist. Right from the father (also the narrator of the story) who includes his co-passengers as characters in his plots (diagonally opposed to how they appear in real life; like the sophisticated lady is a uncouth foul mouthed woman in his story) to entertain his inquisitive daughter.
The strange stories he creates toying with the desperation of a man who forgets to pay his oxygen bill, the woman who buys a mate at a supermarket only to discover that he's expired commodity, the families, in a peaceful neighborhood, who go to war, literally. Each one is a sordid tale of what lies inside of us all. That's what scares. The fact that the narrator's exaggeration may not be far from the truth. At the same time, in the end, the tale is robbed off the narrator's hands as he realizes that life's taken a turn and placed him in a strange story instead.