Review of Lootera

Release date –5'th July 2013

One Word which describes the film – Soulful

Best  Dialogue – 'Pehli baar jab tumhe dekha , toh thodi der ke liye laga ki main mar gaya ' 

Genre – Romance /Drama

Story - Vikramaditya Motwane 

(based on "The Last Leaf" by O.Henry )

Music – Amit Trivedi

Producer - Anurag Kashyap , Ekta Kapoor , Shobha Kapoor , Vikas Bahl

Direction - Vikramaditya Motwane

Cast – Ranveer Singh , Sonakshi Sinha , Vikrant Massey ,Arif Zakaria , Adil Hussain

Budget - 35 crores ( approximately )

Lootera set in 1950's is the love story of a rich Zamindar's daughter and a young man who comes and stays at their home.
The film starts with a Ramleela scene where we are introduced to the two main characters of the film ,Pakhi  and her doting father the Zamindar of Manikpur. Pakhi is an artistic, strong willed girl who is not afraid of telling what her heart wants.
The Zamindar is worried because, post-independence the zamindari system has come to an end and he has to surrender his lands and precious artifects to the government.

The sets of the film look real with emphasis on minute details like the presence of a gramophone in the living room, antique furniture , vintage car, and an old radio playing songs of Dev Anand's film 'Baazi' . 

The second half shot in Dalhousie , captures the natural beauty of the town. 
So despite having good sets ,great music and above average actors why didn't the film appeal to the audience ?

All of us who have read 'The last leaf' , know it's a short story about two girls and an old painter who wishes to create a master piece. 

To convert this short story into a full fledged film the director converted it into a love story with lots of unnecessary tragedies and pathos. 

Sonakshi Sinha manages to give an award winning performance in the film. With her minimal makeup and rich sarees she looks like a rich heiress. In the second half her pale face and dark circles look so real that you feel pity for her.

Ranveer Singh's clean shaven look in first half wearing high waist trousers is quiet 1950's. Though , I wonder why most of his dialogues were dubbed in such a low voice that they were hardly audible.

In a line , the film is surely not made for the masses and has many slow sequences where you will get bored and  wonder when is it going to end.

Can be seen when is aired on TV .

Rank- 16 (out of the 35 films I have seen in 2013)

(You can read the story 'The Last Leaf ' here - http://www.online-literature.com/donne/1303/ )

Preview of Bhaag Milkha Bhaag

Release date – 12'th July 2013

One Word which describes the film – Motivational

Best  Dialogue (promos) – 
'Ye apki zindagi ki akhiri race saabit ho sakti hai .'
Milkha- ' Daudunga bhi waise hi. '

Genre – Sports /Biography

Story - Prasoon Joshi

Music – Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy

Producer - Viacom 18 , Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra

Direction - Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra

Cast – Farhan Akhtar , Sonam Kapoor, Prakash Raj , Yograj Singh

Budget - 30 crores

Duration- 188 minutes

Bhaag Milkha Bhaag is the most awaited film of 2013 .The name of the film comes from the last words spoken by Milkha Singh's father, which were to save his life during the riots of Partition of India. The story tells about his perseverance and courage as an athlete.

Farhan underwent extensive preparation for the film's Ladakh schedule .He went to a  training center in the suburbs, which specialises in training people to adapt themselves to harsh conditions. He trained there and religiously ran around 10-12 km every day. While in Ladakh, he would sprint for hours together in the backdrop of jawans coming out for a jog. He would tie a rope to his waist and do a high intensity tyre and rope workout and run for several hours . All the preparation showed when the first promo was launched in which the 39 year old actor managed to look like a lean and well  toned athlete in his 20's.

Sonam Kapoor has charged only Rs 11 for the films  and claims that she blindly trusts the film-maker.
On being asked about her reason behind signing the film for Rs 11, Sonam said, "They had a budget and they told me they can't give money and that's why I said give Rs 11 and I will do the film.

After watching the film Milkha Singh said  ,"Farhan Akhtar has done a brilliant job. He looked like my duplicate in the movie.  It was my son's decision to make the movie for Rs 1. However, I mentioned a clause in the agreement that 10-15 per cent of the profit which the movie makes will go to our trust which promotes athletes. 

The music of the film is good. Hawan kund and Zinda have become popular among the young generation . 

The film will get a very good opening and can easily collect 30-35 crores or more in it's opening weekend. The only drawback can be it's 3 hour plus duration .I hope the director has made an engrossing  film which makes the audience forget everything and just be a part of Milkha Singh's journey from being a refugee to a carefree young guy to a devoted athlete.

Rank- 2 out of the 40 films I have seen in 2013 

Review of Raanjhana

Release date –21'st June 2013

One Word which describes the film – Intriguing

Best  Dialogue – 
"Mere piche scooter mai baithna padega. Main break maarunga toh mujhpe girna padega. Mere saath naachna-gaana padega. Girlfriend na sahi..feel hi dede"

Genre – Romance /Drama

Story - Himanshu Sharma

Music – A. R. Rahman

Producer - Krishika Lulla

Direction - Anand L. Rai

Cast – Dhanush , Sonam Kapoor , Abhay Deol , Swara Bhaskar , Mohammed Zeeshan Ayyub

Budget - 35 crores

The promos of the film showed a love story in a rustic background and melodious music by A.R.Rehman . The film starts with the dialogue ,"Ek baat main samajh gaya hoon. Ladki aur rocket aapko kahin bhi le jaa sakte hain"  
We are presented with a hero who knows he is dark and not very good looking and still is madly in love with a pretty girl and wants to get her by hook or crook . Till interval the film has lots of comic moments.


Dhanush has done full justice to his role. It's hard to imagine any other 30 year actor play the role of a 17 year old. In his school dress and clean shaven look he looks like a teenager who is desperate to express his feelings to his crush.   
Dhanush and Zeeshan as childhood friends  share an amazing chemistry . The dialogues  they share like ,  "Tumhara pyaar na ho gaya..UPSC ka exam ho gaya. 10 saal se paas hi nai ho raha" is an important factor in the film's success .

Sonam Kapoor as the manipulative Zoya has given a good performance though in the second half most of the time she has the same expressions on her face .

Abhay Deol has a short role and totally fades in front of Dhanush.

In a line though the love story may not be perfect with everyone using everyone else for their benefit but the characters of the film are so real and down to earth that you can relate with them .

Must watch for a totally paisa-vasool first half . 

Rank - 15  ( out of the 54 films  I have seen in 2013 )

Review of Policegiri

Release date –5'th July 2013

One Word which describes the film – Combo

Best  Dialogue –
'Aapko dekh kar aisa lagta hai jaise Gabbar Singh ne police force join kar li ho'

Genre – Action /Comedy

Story -  Hari ( remake of the 2003 Tamil film Saamy )

Music – Himesh Reshammiya , Meet Bros Anjjan

Producer - T.P. Aggarwal , Rahul Aggarwal

Direction - K. S. Ravikumar

Cast – Sanjay Dutt , Prakash Raj , Prachi Desai

Budget- 25- 30 crores (approximately) 

The film started in a Rohit Shetty kind of style with flying cars , flying people and lots of gun shots and noise. Sanjay Dutt must have completed the opening scenes just before going to prison as he looked haggard and out of shape.
With the entry of Prakash Raj the film started becoming entertaining. There were many humorous scenes between Sanjay Dutt and Prakash Raj . 

We all have seen many dubbed South Indian films but there is something motivational in watching a film where the hero fights corruption and cleans the city of corrupt politicians.

Prachi Desai is too young to play Sanjay Dutt's love interest . The couple looked very odd. It's good that she had a very small  role and mostly appeared in the song and dance sequences.

Om Puri was totally wasted in the role of a helpless Commissioner .
  
In a line , even though Sanjay Dutt doing policegiri is not as good as Sanjay doing Gandhigiri , the film has a good story and dialogues to keep you entertained .

Time-pass. Can be seen in theaters if you like remakes of South Indian films.

Rank - 22 (out of the 34 films I have seen in 2013)

Review of Ghanchakkar

Release date –28'th June 2013

One Word which describes the film – ' Hain ? '

Best  Dialogue – 
'10 crore , 10 crore kya  ? '
'Bihar ki abaadi ! '

Genre – Comedy / Thriller

Story - Parvez Shaikh

Music – Amit Trivedi

Producer - Ronnie Screwvala , Siddharth Roy Kapur

Direction - Rajkumar Gupta

Cast – Emraan Hashmi , Vidya Balan , Rajesh Sharma , Namit Das

Budget - 20 crores

In an interview , Emraan Hashmi said that people were not happy with the unfinished love story between Silk and Abraham in The Dirty Picture and so Ghanchakkar can be a continuation of that affair. If anyone saw the film expecting the same chemistry between the lead actors they must have been so disappointed . The promos promised us a lazy husband and crazy wife but we were presented with an overweight fashion disaster loud wife who could even not prepare fried rice and a husband who had the same expression through out the film  !

Though the film started with a good pace ,showing the hilarious interactions between the married couple slowly it started becoming repetitive and boring. 

Rajkumar Gupta who has directed and also written  memorable films like Aamir (2008) and No One Killed Jessica (2011) totally fails to hold the audience interest. After interval most of us had given up on guessing and were hoping for some good suspense but the way the film ended was it's weakest point and the main reason for the negative word of mouth . 

Music composed  by Amit Trivedi  (who shot to fame  after Dev D ) is melodious .
In a line the only moral we got after 2 hours was , ' if your wife cooked and dressed up like Vidya's character in the film it's better to lose your memory .'
Avoidable . Can be seen when is aired on TV .   

Rank - 22 (out of the 33 films I have seen in 2013)