Mini-reviews, part paanch.

Did you know "punch" was originally an Indian drink, and the word came from 'paanch', Hindi for five? It's true! Not to be confused with Punsch, the Swedish traditional liquor that goes by the name "punssi" in Finland, generally consumed during Shrove Tuesday, which was yesterday. I had a pulla and it was lovely.

Oh, right, mini-reviews. The idea of these is to cover many movies quickly without making a post about each of them. The previous ones are here. I might eventually review some of these at length but for now, small paragraphs will suffice! These are films I've seen ages ago, most way before I began this blog.


41. Boys (2003) - This Tamil film by Shankar is a celebration of youth, a spring-board for many a young star (or perhaps just Siddharth and Bharath). The A. R. Rahman soundtrack is modern and rocking. Too bad the movie's not great. It has some pretty nice comedy but overall it's just not up to standards set by later movies with some of the cast members, or films directed by Shankar. Still, for a Siddharth completist, it's a must-see.

42. Jodhaa Akbar (2008) - Originally reviewed here. Damn epic, glorious film. But maybe a little too epic, too glorious? The visuals are nice, the love story is wonderful and the chemistry between Aishwarya and Hrithik is certainly there, but I think it suffers from the typical Ashutosh Gowariker flaw of being overly long, and a little too packed. Nevertheless, this historical epic has it all, and the hottest sword-fight ever.

43. Don (1978) - Originally reviewed here. I like the original Don but it doesn't fall into any favourites categories. Then again, neither does the remake. It's basically just a lovely 70's classic, with a badass Zeenat performance (her character beats Priyanka in the remake any day of the week).

44. Hamesha (1997) - Ugh, almost don't want to write about this movie. So, Kajol and Saif are favourites and unfortunately this is the only film in which they are romantically paired with (Yeh Dillagi doesn't really count to me since it's clear she only loves Akshay's character in that film). It's this supposedly epic re-incarnation story that is just so horrifically 90's with the fashion and the melodrama and the mullet and it just.. Please do not watch it. Even if many people have actually enjoyed it and been like "What's wrong with you, it's great cheese!". I like cheese. But this cheese stinks.

45. Andaz Apna Apna (1994) - My favourite comedy in any language ever, reviewed here. It's also really loud and slapstick and not everybody's thing but what do I care? It is so my thing.

46. Lekin... (1990) - Slow-paced but rather interesting supernatural mystery type film from director Gulzar. I watched this because it had Vinod Khanna and Dimple Kapadia, and a brilliant dance sequence by Hema Malini, the best one I've ever seen her do. If you don't mind watching 90's Vinod, it's a good film to go for, though like most Gulzar films, it's pretty slow and has super-long song sequences. Only this director can make a poetic film about such a peculiar question as, "Do ghosts exist?".

47. Shaque (1976) - A Vinod-Shabana film I watched in sync with Carla, my review here and hers is here. It's a weird one, basically a lowkey drama film about a wife (Shabana) who suspects her husband (Vinod) has killed a man and the drifts this causes in their marriage. As a drama goes, it's pretty good, but at some point near the end the film takes a sudden left turn and goes all masala on us. It's really sad it's not a better film because if it was, it'd be the best sample of this pair's collaboration.

48. Gangster (2006) - Does anybody else feel weird talking about Shiney Ahuja after his trouble with the law regarding a rape charge? Ugh, anyway. Gangster's an okay film. I thought Kangana as the woman struggling with her love being a gangster was effective, but that's about it - I hate to be judgmental but this movie basically made sure I'll never watch another Emraan Hashmi film. The utterly ripped off soundtrack is unfortunately also very catchy. Pritam, how we hate you.

49. Patthar Aur Payal (1974) - This is basically an okay 70's masala I like perhaps a little too much for its actual quality; it's one of those films that has crystalized as special to me even though it's merely all right. Dharmendra plays a bandit reformed by the love of a good woman (Hema Malini). But naturally there's a villain (Vinod Khanna). There are some pretty nice songs, though. Here's my favourite.

50. Life in a Metro (2007) - Hey, doesn't this share a director with Gangster? This film has a cast of characters whose lives zigzag in the city of Mumbai. Again, it's an okay film with some stand-out performances (Irfan! Sharman Joshi! Konkona Sen Sharma!). Kangana again plays a deeply troubled young woman, which makes me wonder if she's being a little typecast.. The film has its good moments, which is why I could edit it down to the better storylines and cut out all the distracting songs, picturized badly on a bunch of guys who wander the streets aimlessly.

Dear Abby, is my husband a murderer? Shaque.

On paper Shaque looks like a Gulzar movie; both of its stars zigzagged between mainstream and not-so-mainstream cinema (Shabana more than Vinod, though) during the golden 70's, and the film's title and subject, suspicion and what it does to a marriage, has the potential to live up to an interesting human drama of sorts.

The sad thing is, it doesn't quite reach that.


Vinod and Meena's happy marital life becomes strained after Meena receives a letter from a person claiming to have seen Vinod murder a coworker years ago. At first she refuses to believe it but there are suspicious signs - how come he needs the help of sleeping pills to rest every night? Where did he get all that money years ago, when they had a baby on the way and were struggling to find the means to survive? Meena's suspicion continues to grow and tensions in the marriage build up.

There's nothing that awfully wrong with Shaque, maybe apart from somebody getting lazy with the script writing by the end. It starts out an okay drama with a couple of standout moments, and all the actors do a good job with what they have. It's not Shabana's fault that Meena comes off as hopelessly easily lead by various people and more than a little naive. Closer to the end, you see her make conclusions that are peculiar to say the least, but overall the quality of the script plummets so bad during the same time, it's hard to blame her. The film turns into a peculiar masala thriller of sorts at the end, more ridiculous than anything.

But onto the positives; one of the reasons I had Gulzar on the brain during the first half of the film was that I saw his name on the credits as 'the lyricist'. And indeed the lyrics were often poignant and fitting to the situations of the movie. Otherwise the soundtrack was bland, and all the songs were integrated in an unconventional "they're listening to the radio" manner, which might've worked, had Shaque stayed consistently non-mainstream to the end.


And I suppose the script wasn't all bad. The intrigue of whether or not Vinod actually committed the murder is played up so that it takes a while until the viewer figures out how things really came down. A thing or two can also be said about Vinod's acting - there are times where his experience in playing villains really shows. Another plus was the way the film portrayed marriage, its bliss and eventual decay.

I of course was lucky enough to watch this in sync with Filmi Geek, which was fun especially when the film veered off to the WTF zone of unknown. I'm not sure how to recommend the film itself; it's merely alright, and has those persuasive positives (daring bed scene! Vinod on a horse! snuggly Shabana-Vinod jodi!) but also those peculiar negatives that just rather spoil the ride.


* Bonus fangirly note; 70's glasses? Always a riot. Pink shirt towards the end? I was so massively amused I cannot even picture. Manpain? Sufficient. In conclusion? Still the hottest oldie actor, yes indeed.

A round-up of sorts.

I was going to type up a post about an old favourite of mine, Anniyan, but instead got an idea to do this..

• I'm going to be in England - not just London - March 2nd-12th. The gods of Bollyluck are not on my side; the only decent Indian movie playing in theaters during that time will be Jodhaa-Akbar. Oh and Subhash Ghai's latest which will premiere on the 7th. Whoopdedoo. I'm disappointed but looking at the positives; JA is getting good reviews, and there is more to England than Indian movies. I am, after all, visiting about five locations and going to two gigs whilst there. And plenty of Indian food will be available!
• Nothing new on the Tashan front. Okay, that's a big fat lie and I now it; recently Akshay replied in an interview that he looks best with Saif. I could make this stuff up but luckily this time, I didn't have to.
• If you're tired of looking at Kareena's diet photos, Piyaara did a wonderful picspam of his favourite actresses in South-Indian films, you know, where the ladies are allowed a few pounds extra. And you know what? They still look amazingly beautiful, as this list proves.
• I'm going to be watching a Hindi oldie called Shaque (starring Vinod Khanna & Shabana Azmi) in synch with Filmi Geek tonight. Exciting!

That's it from me for now.