FilmyReviews

This picture though, smartly written and filmed (Shakun Batra, fine debut), is mellow yet dramatic, softer, subtler, more ‘plush interiors’ American rom-com. More than occasionally, it lights up your mood, brings a smile to your face. What else should you demand from a genre that usually sets the bar so low: Girl meets boy; one falls in love before the other; they live happily ever after. Is the girl merely being friendly, or leading the boy on, is a conflict more common to less segregated, urban, real lives, like yours or mine. This one captures that vagueness quite well. That’s neat subversion all right: completely worth your while!

Fade in. Film starts. Camera zooms in on a mysteriously undivided Madhya Pradesh on the Indian map. Either the movie’s set before 2000, or the filmmakers don’t know better. Singer Kailash Kher cranks up the volume with a noisy song that suitably goes, “Corruption, corruption, corruption ka shor hai,” referring to how those who should’ve stayed back in Chambal live in Delhi now. The person you probably think of is bandit queen Phoolan Devi – once a member of parliament, now no more.

The set-up here is enjoyable still. You know the payoff will be an issue. The audience gets an excuse to travel across LKO (Lucknow), DEL, BOM, GOA, the hero gets to play the crooks Iqbal, Sunny, Devesh, Diego. While his locations and phones change, his cellphone’s ringtone remains the same. It’s always the filmy dialogue, “Haarke Jeetne Wale Ko Baazigar Kehte Hain.” It helps the girls track him down. At worst, the film remains then a yawn inducing, half explained romance; at best, it’s an effortless watch all the way.

This is supposedly meant to be a happy film, since we’re talking about exploited men after all. It'd become Chandni Bar if there was a woman dancing or sleeping around for an orphaned nephew! There’s a swingin’ dance track in there, Subah Hone Na De, possibly the zingiest Bollywood discotheque number I’ve heard since Char Baj Gaye, the copy of Black Eyed Peas’ My Hump, which apparently made the aptly titled film Faltu a commercial success earlier this year. This is how such movies work. So you never know.

Ranbir, truly the rockstar! The canvas is wide like early Sanjay Leela Bhansali's; bird's eye view of the stunning bridge is very Mani Ratnam; witty, earthy dialogues are so Vishal Bhardwaj. Director Imitiaz Ali (Jab We Met, Love Aaj Kal) manages to retain a personal, auteur's touch in a genre vastly commercial, mainstream. This is a rare feat. From its start, to the way it progresses, you can tell, the film’s been through various stages of editing and several second thoughts. Sometimes the patchiness shows. It's a stretch. You still don't begrudge a movie that's been this engaging, entertaining thus far. Oh, and did I forget. This is the best soundtrack of AR Rahman’s since Delhi 6 (early 2009). The compositions should grow on you. So should this film, surely.

Tennis champ “Chirag baba” claims to be in love with a fashion model instead. He’s never quite met her. Daddy, mommy are after this girl. He pays her Rs 20 lakh a day, for 20 days, to carry on with the pretense of being in love with him. That model's Kangna Ranaut. Reports in trade circles suggest she was paid Rs 5 crore to do this movie. Anybody should be.

Govinda is yet the super-star here, who doesn’t need dialogue sheets for his lines, he can get away blabbering anything. Javed Jaffery ad-libs alongside. Sunil Shetty is He Man. One Mahakshay, actor formerly known as Mimoh, better known as son of 'Prabhujee' Mithunda, plays a cuddly Cassanova from Bandra that girls instantly dig. Together they loot a don’s (Mahesh Manjrekar) house in Pattaya. Audience was never interested.

Flying hero enters earth to save boy. No one in the planet is surprised, or is even aware. The boy’s father’s dead, his colleague’s no more, cars collide. Head of gaming company is busy selling that same software like nothing happened. The only thing the writers are worried about is how G.One will get through security on a frikin’ flight. Which gets you to think about who G.One really is. This supposedly emotionless, part-time gaming super-hero, in designer suits, regular clothes, human skin does everything, short of actually crying: smiles, hugs, quotes the Gita, shakes his pelvis to You Be My Chamak Chalo. His nonchalant hostess (Kareena Kapoor), a grieving widow, takes it quite well; it’s like any other day for her.

The writers have at least made an attempt to put some sense into their supposed script. Though I suppose the background may have been unnecessary. That’s not what most falling for this film will be striking off their checklist. Force is about rapid action. Only. Enough guns go off. As importantly, punches land hard -- hinterland audiences call this mukkabaazi.

The movie is so stretched from both ends, you could see it tearing apart from the centre. The couple’s clueless fathers look on like notable ‘sideys’ in suits. All good things come to an end. Thankfully, that’s true for things not so good as well. You still have to give it to a few casting gems in this movie (hero’s buddies etc), some inspired dialogue-writing that captures the patois of India’s rustic North (one of them, “Bhabi badi frank hain,” rightly makes it to posters!). But what can you give it? Your sympathies, of course.

There's homo-erectus Hashmi, and his frisky heroine. That's what really made the first one a huge, hot hit. The leading couple make out. For no apparent reason. A lot. It's stone cold still. But you never know. Junta will flock. I guess. Even on Youtube, the most viewed, and the publicly best-rated flicks, are rarely the same. Go figure.

The filmmakers were possibly busy scoring a tax-free contract to shoot in Macau. Dialogue writers were giggling over their rhymes in every other line, pun on every second word. The editors were paid to keep their trap shut. Whining women (Kangna Ranaut, Mallika Sherawat) were picked up for pretty posters. Male actors then were naturally left to somehow figure their way through this mess.

Vishal Bhardwaj's directed, produced, written, and composed both soundtrack and background score for this film, revealing himself yet again as that rare Renaissance man in an art form that deserves more. Bhardwaj's screenplay is admittedly based on a reworked Ruskin Bond short story. The author and filmmaker had referred to Quentin Tarantino's female fight fest Kill Bill in their last film together (Blue Umbrella, 2007). Not sure if that should now be listed as premonition, or promise for things to come. But this ain't no Kill Bill. There is no underworld blood-thirst or pornographically gruesome revenge to extract. It's in fact impossible to figure why the serial bride here prefers deaths to simple divorce, jumps into marriage over casual relationships instead. The story line, the main character's motivations, or her mental state, are not the picture's prime concerns. The movie is clearly crafted around strong, effective scenes alone: a lot of it, cleanly cut and clinical, a whole lot immediately compelling.

I step out of the theatre; feeling slightly quiet in the head, walk straight into the noisy city this film is set in. Popular songs play for background score in my cab. The busy street has people rushing, as usual, for God knows where: each unique within a mass. The chatty cabby shares with me some story of Aamir Khan, of all people. We still have something in common, for only a moment, of course. It seemed a scene from Dhobi Ghat! This film is first-rate tribute; it’s visceral, I realise -- both clichés for compliments. Nothing more appropriate comes to mind.

For the movie’s idea of course, the makers here have gone After The Fox. This copying business is understandable, given these pleasant star hunters must have spent the rest of their waking hours media-hopping and money-talking, mainly around a corny song, Sheela Ki Jawani. The track remains their only saving grace. So you can imagine.