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Reviews
Cowboys & Aliens (2011)
Huge Disappointment!
Did someone put a gun to Jon Favreau's head and ask him to make this boring 'western'??
Harrison Ford, Daniel Craig, one of the most fun directors around today, and a title containing both Cowboys and Aliens - this was definitely the most awaited summer movie for me!! And yet, somehow, the 'Curse of The Modern Day Spielberg' managed to defy all expectations and deliver a total damp squib. The story's weak (why capture the humans? why come to earth of all planets to mine for gold? how can one stolen gun destroy an entire operation?), the treatment confused (the whole Olivia Wilde arc), the actors under-utilized (somebody please stop the brutal destruction of everything that Harrison Ford has come to mean to moviegoers), and the action and thrills extremely underwhelming.
Please do not go to see this movie. More than the time that you'll never get back, it'll spoil James Bond, Indy, Cowboys, Westerns and Movie Aliens for you forever.
To think that I missed work to catch the first, early morning opening show. So disappointed.
Gulaal (2009)
Kay Kay scorches the screen!
A film maker of Anurag Kashyap's brilliance, passion, and originality of thought has been wanting to tell this story for so long, that it feels almost petty to admit that the movie didn't really rock my boat. Largely because it seemed to favour a very mundane story arc fronted by Raja Chaudhary over a much more interesting one featuring Kay Kay Menon's acting masterclass. Yes ladies and gentlemen, Kay Kay's back! After a spate of homogeneous, non-challenging roles which barely required him to show up on set, he embraces and radiates Mrityunjay Singh's charisma, passions and dreams in GULAAL with such finesse and force, that you get hooked-on from the first frame and want to follow his powerhouse performance far beyond its limited screen time, into a completely different and engaging movie, which sadly GULAAL isn't.
We have all been part of or witnessed college elections, experienced the politics, explored the various angles and alliances, and maybe even got surprised by the rapidly switching allegiances. It is this very commonplace and ordinarily narrated segment that doesn't quite become a launchpad for an entertaining 3-hour movie, which I'm assuming was the film-maker's intent.
With that unfortunate confession off my chest, I can now happily admit to getting lost in the film's rich, melodious and exceedingly interesting soundtrack, as well as being suitably impressed by Abhimanyu Singh's and Deepak Dobriyal's performances. Mahie Gill had a unique, heavy-lidded, earthy sensuality about her in Dev. D, and that comes through in this movie too. Dunno why Jesse Randhawa had to be cast though. Unless Anurag specifically instructed her to put on her best stony-face and talk in a subtle, gradually claustrophobic monotone no matter what happens in the exciting land of Rajputana, in which case she nails the part.
In summary, the movie features great music (& lyrics) and numerous remarkable performances, none more fascinating than Kay Kay's, but fails to click as a cinematic whole. I would give it 5 stars out of 10, with an additional half-a-star thrown in for the 'Pyaasa' reference.
Omkara (2006)
Shakespeare and Saif carry the movie through
OK. Omkara delivers a powerful climax. But you'd expect that from any re-telling of Othello, even in less competent hands than Vishal's. That's just how engaging the play is, on its own. Also, Saif Ali Khan! Smashing performance.. one of the few keeping in line with all the pre-release hype and the overdose of "I would've loved to do Saif's role" humble actor-not-star comments. The music too deserves an independent ovation of its own, time and again elevating the movie to heights which unfortunately, the accompanying performances and dialogues just don't match. While these pros definitely make Omkara a must watch, they still cannot camouflage the film's tepid pace and an omnipresent feeling of a promise lost, as Shakespeare's Othello unfolds in rural Uttar Pradesh.
Brilliant storytelling opportunities like the one provided by the delicious casting of Ajay Devgan (Omi) and Viveik Oberoi (Kesu) as the mentor and his understudy constantly go begging throughout the film. Both characters also suffer from underdevelopment and rely too much on the viewer to imagine and establish in his mind, their strengths, weaknesses, and motivations. While on character development, AD, there's only so far you can go with intense, brooding eyes and wooden facial expressions. Konkona Sen Sharma gives in a competent girl-next-door performance, and her love as well as outrage scenes come across as genuine. Naseeruddin Shah and Kareena Kapoor are just about average, which is not to say that they do not do justice to their comparatively insignificant roles that the movie demands. But in the acting department, Omkara is an out and out Saif-show. His Langda Tyagi straddles so many emotions so magnificently, and the confrontation scene at the very end of the movie with Omi is pure genius! Tassaduq Hussain's cinematography also deserves special mention, and is very good when there are no people in the frame. Here, the dialogues and character-interplay let him down.
Vishal Bharadwaj is talented, no doubt. But great script and rousing music alone doth not a classic make