Podcast-review - Google / Samsung
MURDER MUBARAK - 2.0 STARS. G
Directed by - Homi Adajania
Starring - Sara Ali Khan, Vijay Varma, Karisma Kapoor, Dimple Kapadia, Tisca Chopra, Sanjay Kapoor, Pankaj Tripathi
Why - It's inspired by Knives Out. Its a murder mystery and it has a lot of twists. Return of Karishma.
Why Not - It's inspired by Knives out, but that's where the similarity ends. Pankaj Tripathi has lost his comic timing worse than Hardik Pandya losing his winning touch. He is atrocious and bad in everything he does. Sara and Karishma need acting lessons. The mystery is there but you would not be wanting to know whodunnit.
MERRY CHRISTMAS - 3.5 STARS. PG.
Directed by - Sriram Raghavan
Starring - Katrina Kaif, Vijay Sethupathi
Why - Vijat Sethupathi is a pretty bankable star. His movies are generally good. One of the better stars from south. Katrina has found a new life, it's called acting. Both of them do a nice jugalbandi that works. The movie is slow and you need to sit back and enjoy all the moments and try to piece the puzzle together as you have your popcorn. Old school pace but a good plot. No wonder it is based on a novel written decades ago. Watch it.
Why Not - Something is amiss as far as modern movie making is concerned. Feels empty for long periods of time. Not much happens until Interval, could have used some editing (which can be said for every Hindi movie).
DUNKI - 1.5 STARS. PG.
Directed by - Rajkumar Hirani
Starring - Taapsee Pannu, Shah Rukh Khan, Boman Irani, Anil Grover, Vikram Kochhar, Vicky Kaushal
Why - Hard to say why you should watch this one. Maybe because you already have watched it so I don't need to answer this one.
Why Not - Too many reasons, but let's welcome Rajkumar Hirani into 'uncle-hood'. He is one of those Directors who are stuck in their era of movie making. Now if he works with Aamir he may still give a good movie but then that won't be considered his. Shah Rukh Khan has reached uncle level quite a while back, he is ridiculously bad in this movie. Trying his oft repeated 90s style comedy, though to his defense the movie was made in 90s (in Rajkumar Hirani's mind). Everyone acts really bad except Mr Vicky Kaushal who is probably in purple patch of his acting form and can't do anything wrong. Boman Irani should be banned from acting. Taapsee - please stop trying to feature with SRK.
SAM BAHADUR - 3.5 STARS. PG.
Directed by - Meghna Gulzar
Starring - Vicky Kaushal, Fatima Sana Shaikh, Sanya Malhotra
Why - 3 reasons to watch it - Mr Vicky Kaushal, Mr Vicky Kaushal and Mr Vicky Kaushal. I don't know how Sam Bahadur looked like, but I know Vicky is Sam Bahadur. It is kind of a biopic of this parsi general of India who is the GOAT.
Why Not - Seeing Meghna Gulzar making this one sided administration pleasing movies makes me puke. India is on it's way to zero freedom of expression. Making a war movie showing everything great about a person and showing the then administration in bad light to please the current administration is a recipe of a movie that is not honest. Why make one?
BHAKSHAK - 4.0 STARS. R
Directed by - Pulkit
Starring - Bhumi Pednekar, Sanjay Mishra, Aditya Srivastava, Sai Tamhankar
Why - Sanjay Mishra is good, and Bhumi plays it well. a Couple of no name journalist won't budge from truth. In today's India sounds too idealistic but the movie is well done. The 2 show grit and determination to fight, you pull for them as the movie progresses. Bhumi is the first female actor who changes her dialect and learns how to speak Bihari. For the longest time I have wondered why do female leads never change their language according to the region they are representing!
Why Not - Kinda artsy slowish but plot does have enough commercial element. But you get the point, basically there is no item number or romance. Instead it tackles sexual exploitation of minors. I know you muttered I don't want to get depressed.
LAAPATA LADIES - 5.0 STARS. G.
Directed by - Kiran Rao
Starring - Nitanshi Goel, Sparsh Shrivastava, Pratibha Ranta, Abhay Dubey, Chhaya Kadam, Ravi Kishan
Why - Do me a favor, just watch it instead of asking why why why. Oh... you never asked me? It's me who is asking the Why and responding to it? Okay, that's fine. I will answer it. Beautiful beautiful beautiful poetry of a movie. Aamir Khan Productions and Kiran Rao at the helm. What could have gone wrong? Take a bow Ms Kiran Rao, you are awesome. Every scene is so well thought and done with love for the craft. Even the premise of the movie is hilariously patriarchal. It has a subtle undercurrent of comedy. How do you keep it light and funny while the characters are having a meltdown of their lives! Beautifully done by everyone from Nitanshi and Pratibha to the male leads in Sparsh and Abhay. Surprisingly great role by Ravi Kishan who provides us the twist.
Why Not - Have said it many times. If you only watch "Bollywood" then don't watch it. It is definitely not the big movie you want to watch. Also, no India - Pakistan, in fact it is a loving criticism of your beloved culture.
CRAKK - 3.0 STARS. G.
Directed by - Aditya Datt
Starring - Vidyut Jammwal, Arjun Rampal, Nora Fatehi, Amy Jackson
Why - It has been a while we saw Vidyut. He is getting wider and shorter somehow. But who cares we like him. The movie is a Hunger games desi version. Good stunts and umm... good stunts? I love the tag line of the movie - Jeetega to Jiyegaa.
Why Not - Vidyut hardly give a great movie, but we like him. Arjun is looking pretty atrocious as a villain. Looks more like a video game than a movie, very cheap side actors and made on shoe string budget with a lot of stylish tacky special effects.
TERI BAATON MEIN AISA ULJHA JIYA - 4.0 STARS. G.
Teri Baaton Mein Aisa Uljha Jiya - Trailer
Directed by - Amit Joshi, Aradhana Sah
Starring - Shahid Kapoor, Kriti Sanon
Why - I know what you think about me. Old man doesn't know how to have fun, liking all the heavy and serious movies. If you read my garbage blog you are permitted to hate on me. I am totally fine with it. But here is the answer to your prayers. This is the movie that is all out fun with zero problems. Simple straight forward Bollywood entertainer. You know what is great about it, it's not copied, it doesn't cater to tried and trusted formulas but still an out and out entertainer. An AI revolution Bollywood style. A robot who is human, a computer engineer who is a good looking human? umm.. that was a stretch but it was fun. Go watch it. Awesome jokes great laughs and just stupid entertainer.
Why Not - If you watched the trailer then that was the entire movie chronologically put together.
JORAM - 3.5 STARS. PG13.
Directed by - Devashish Makhija
Starring - Manoj Bajpayee, Mohammed Zeeshan Ayyub
Why - Dalit man wants to run, but where will he run? The world is not for him but he wants his daughter to live. So he has to run and he will run. Some people come to this world marked. So they run and Joram's dad gotta run. The thick accent in the movie is almost impossible to understand which adds to the movie and proves it's genre of being an art movie.
Why Not - This is the kind of movie that I like and you judge me. But I always put an Asterix saying this is an artsy movie. Well from this edition I stopped categorizing movies in various categories. Why? Because ... umm.. I am late by 3 weeks in releasing this blog and no one is waiting. So due to those reasons I am rushing through it. Yes so this movie is not artsy, it is a perfect art movie. The guy runs and runs and runs.... that's all he does.
STARFISH - 1.0 STARS. G.
Directed by - Akhilesh Jaiswal
Starring - Khushalii Kumar, Milind Soman, Ehan Bhat, Tushar Khanna
Why - Milind Soman hilariously looking like Jesus Christ and talking like Gautam Budhha. It is just hilarious.
Why Not - The movie pretends to be this socially relevant, philosophically great, genius movie. But it's all a bad pretense. The lead actor, Khushali probably has paid everyone to make this movie, because she wants to do everything, be heartbroken, be sexy, be drunk, be depressed, be funny.... let's put all of my greatness in one movie and let's make a complicated genius movie. I think that was the assignment.
12th FAIL - 5.0 STARS. G.
Directed by - Vidhu Vinod Chopra
Starring - Vikrant Massey, Medha Shankar, Anant V Joshi, Anshumaan Pushkar
Why - Vidhu Vinod Chopra is another uncle director who always was an Uncle. Even when he was young he was an uncle. But the guy still is not the uncle-director that Rajkumar Hirani is. This guy still got some left in him. I am watching the movie and I don't know why I feel this lump in my throat, why is a grown a$$ man crying in a movie? Well, I always cry so not saying much. You get the point, this tugs at your heart. You root for this underprivileged villager to succeed and find a place in civil services one of toughest exams in India. The story is something you have seen many times but somehow the details it plucks from this man's life and puts them in front of us with sincerity makes you cry. Well, makes me cry. Vikrant plays the role to perfection but this girl Medha Shankar knocks the ball outta the park for sure.
Why Not - Same answer as others. No item number. No helicopter scene, no train heist, love story is not in swiss alps. You get the point.
DRY DAY - 2.5 STARS. G
Directed by - Saurabh Shukla
Starring - Jitendra Kumar, Shriya Pilgaonkar, Annu Kapoor
Why - You root for some movies to do well. You want them to be good. This is one of them. I like Jitendra Kumar, and his body of work. This is a cute movie. Jitendra kumar plays this not so good guy who still is likeable who wants to be a corporator in the world of dirty politics.
Why Not - The movie falls short of being anything more than cute. Jitendra is a good actor but fails in very special moments when he has to take the scene to higher emotional levels. This one sadly did not go anywhere.
GANAPATH - 3.0 STARS. G.
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Directed by - Vikas Bahl
Starring - Tiger Shroff, Amitabh Bachchan, Kriti Sanon, Elli AvrRam
Why - It is a typical Tiger shroff kinda movie. It is similar but probably a little better than Crakk. Now you will say what is Crakk, please scroll up. The one you skipped because you did not recognize the star! This is the kind which you watch and then next day you don't remember you did watch it. No toll on your brain or emotions, a good nice time pass.
Why Not - How many such movies will tiger do? Come on Tiger! I know your dad named you tiger, not your fault but you don't have to leap in the air naked and kick someone in the face all the time! Let's get down to something better. ok son? thanks.
FIGHTER - 3.5 STARS. PG13.
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Directed by - Siddharth Anand
Starring - Hrithik Roshan, Deepika Padukone, Anil Kapoor
Why - You want a Desi Tom Cruise? You got it. Our hot and gracefully 'olding' Hrithik Roshan. The movie is about Air Force and all the elements of Top Gun are stuffed in it with dollops of desi masala. Hritik and Deepika are not just pilots but also dance with almost no clothes on beaches to bollywoodish songs that you can't remember as soon as they are over. But it is all fun and games dialogues and action and romance and emotions. Hritik emotes in a few scenes and makes you cry when he makes Deepika's parents realize they love their daughter with in like few minutes of meeting them. But Hritik does it.
Why Not - How much hate is enough hate? The movie tries to suck up to the Indian government and puts in so called real life events into the movie in shameless show of sycophancy. Bollywood groveling on their knees to let them make money is another list of people who have been cut down to size. Sad to see but again... How much hate is too much hate? Answer is - Hate begets hate. More the better.
