Queen Bee Kangana had good helper bees

OMG, did I love this movie!  Queen has supersized Bollywood in regard to good contemporary female roles. We watch  Rani. (Kanagana Ranaut) brilliantly evolving from a place of innocence and learned helplessness vis-a-vis men,  to resilience and newly conquered strengths. Most movies that succeed in doing so don’t dare to combine drama with comedy. Queen does. That’s why you walk out uplifted and hopeful. Which, let’s face it, is the ultimate success formula. The beast (of your fears) is conquered. Off to new lands.

Many Indian movies I have seen, do the opposite. They start out uplifting and then start sagging through the second half, with intro of unforeseen dramatic events. Queen goes the other way. We start emphasizing with sweet and innocent Rani, who gets dumped a day before her wedding.What exactly motivates her to go on her honeymoon by herself, isn’t very clear, or maybe it is that seed of rebellion against becoming a victim and after locking herself in a room reliving her relationship with fiancee Vijay (Rajkummar Rao) in her mind. She remembers all that was good, and it’s breaking our hearts.

When the wedding banner “Rani Weds Vijay” gets thrown into the garbage, unknownst to her, her will to live, despite this obvious downfall, takes the upper hand. She reemerges from her 2 day exile and soon after, with the support of her loving family, she boards the plane to Paris.

Here she gets forced out of her protected childhood shell and has to switch gear to survival mode. This never comes easy. But in this movie it’s plastered with funny episodes. You cheer for Rani, you laugh with Rani and you see the West through her eyes. But contrary to many Indian films that make all Westerners and foreigners look like devils reincarnate, there is only one mean guy who she encounters. And she triumphs. Thank you, Vikas Bahl, for your kind portrayal of all foreigners in this movie. Makes it unique.

The whole cast in this movie is OUTSTANDING!! from mom, dad, grandmother and lil bro to all the people she encounters abroad. A well-chosen cast! Kudos to Parita Mandalia and Atul Mongic, (mentioned as the casting team in the credits). They found the quintessential Indian family in , people I would like to have as my family and everybody should have in their closet.. they are kind and understanding and supportive. Don’t you just love the father, played by Yogendra Tiku, the mom, (Alka Badola Kaushal), the rocking grandma (Tripita Lakhshanpal) and the lovable brother Chintu (Chinmaya Agarwal).

From Wild Wild Paris we follow Rani to Wild Wild Amsterdam, where she courageously dorms with her new pals Taka, Tim and aka Sikander (Jeffrey Ho, Joseph Guitobh, Mish Bogko) and emulates Emraan Hashmi’s lip-to-lip with restaurateur Marcello (Canadea Lopez Marco).

What I love most about her is that she never becomes anybody else. She sticks to her Rani-ness, to her Indian-ness throughout her journey of self-realization. She doesn’t alter her standards. She stays her ground and only becomes stronger. She learns about her fears. She also now opens her mind to seeing the ‘real Vijay’, his narrow-minded self. Rani sheds embellishments, biases, fears and returns to the fuzzy womb of her family invigorated and self-assured. Ready for the challenges of independence and freedom.

Every time I watched the movie, I discovered sth else, little symbolic gestures. Like the light that goes dark momentarily during the wedding dress rehearsal. Just like Rani’s life gets darkened by a cloud that then lifts and gives rise to a beautiful new day.

When best buddy Vijaylakshmi (Lisa Haydon) enters the room and the wind tousles her hair and reaches the impatiently waiting father and son duo, who want to get a glimpse of the beautiful and carefree Vijaylakshmi. So tender.

The cinematography and direction is flawless. Vikas Bahl has made it to the top. Thank you, Vikas, Kangana, everybody.

AND not to forget, letting us indulge in the foodie waves filling the theater with the spices and aromas of India, and glimpses of Her Majesty, Paris, and  Amsterdam in her upper and underworld glory. What a fun ride this was!

Highway, a review.

Alia and Randeep in Highway

If I had listened to initial reviews I would have made a U-turn on Highway and x-ed out the best Indian film I have seen for a long time!  Anyone I talked to had apparently a problem with the anticipated May-December love between Alia Bhatt and Randeep Hooda. I am not so keen on those stark seasonal discrepancies either, but once you watch the movie you will understand that this isn’t your gardenvariety romance.

Soon-to-be-wed Veera (brilliantly acted by Alia Bhatt, who’s instantly moved to the top of my favorite new female actors list), born into wealth and status, is nursing deep wounds from a past she is trying to suppress. She pledges with her fiancee to elope and settle for a simple life style, where she imagines herself being a wife who lives very modestly amidst nature, cooking with devotion a simple meal for her husband.

Beware what you wish for! How so often in life, our dreams sometimes get fulfilled with an unexpected twist. Being, she gets the chance to live that way for a short period of time and under circumstances neither desired or imagined. She is being kidnapped right off the spot, being at the wrong time in the wrong place. A gas station in the suburbs of Delhi is just getting robbed, she becomes the hostage. This wasn’t planned, neither by her or by her kidnapper Mahabir (Randeep Hooda), who finds himself in the situation of needing to escape fast.. Randeep gives a powerful performance as the illiterate and simple bandit, victimized himself by an abusive father. Little we learn about his circumstances, but enough to understand his plight in a life of hardship and violence.

So, everybody who has seen the movie is trying to rationalize the strange bond of these two main characters, who are thrown at each other randomly, and call it Stockholm syndrome. Veera, the captive and the criminal Mahabir, who didn’t realize that he had abducted a high profile family girl and now runs for his life, with her in tow. Luckily for us, the journey takes us through the magnificent landscapes and villages of Rajasthan, Punjab, Kashmir. We travel with them on one of the colorful, poetically run-down  trucks you can ONLY find in India. I myself don’t want the journey to end, immersed in those awe inspiring landscapes, rugged snow-covered mountains.

After a first failed attempt to escape her kidnappers, Veera resigns herself. She realizes that her captors are at the end just some poor wretched souls. except for one, who leaves very fast after waiting for an opportune moment to rape Veera but gets caught by Mahadir in the nick of time.

She experiences a sense of safety in Mahadir’s presence. charming your captor is a common survival technique. Maybe that’s what she is trying to do in the beginning. She teases, and laughs, and bounces around, uninhibited. Mahadir is unable to read this complex human being. It’s beyond him that she ceases to be afraid. He is a one dimensional thinker. Everything is either black or white in his world, until Veera starts disassembling him, piece by piece. Layer by layer. As she starts revealing to him what man has done to her, and not just man, but family. Not just incest but cover-up, abandonment, Mahadir starts realizing that pain and suffering isn’t class-bound. It’s a difficult concept for him to understand maybe. For him life is a struggle between the rich and the poor. He resents wealth on existential grounds. Initially she is just a problem he needs to solve fast. As she is opening up to him he gradually becomes her protector.

She comes to realize that the dangers and demons lived in her midst, and those perceived outside her world, were actually kinder and protective of her than her own family ever was.

As for the so called romance in this movie, her kidnapper Mahadir could have been hundred years old and have a wooden leg! Mahadir was the first person Veera ever confided to (besides her mother, who in her learned helplessness was unable to perform her motherly duty in protecting her child, for whatever reasons). And that should be a movie in itself!  Mahadir never crosses the line of decency and it redeems him, not that it erases his own past, but he discovers his humanity through Veera.

This movie is all about healing, how to survive and move past violence and insults and biases. It touches you deep in your soul. The ending is the only appropriate ending one can think of. So the movie leaves you with a soft smile and tears in your eyes.

I cannot say enough about the heartfelt performances  of both Alia Bhatt, as well as Randeep Hooda. I always liked him a lot, but I never realized what kind of an acting caliber he possesses, after seeing him in more commercial films that made him only look cool and sexy in a rugged way.

Imitiaz Ali, what can I say, he has done it again! Rockstar, Jab We Met, Socha Na Tha, Ahista Ahista..These are some of my alltime favorite Indian movies. He is a genius! :-)

Last not least, a word about the supporting cast. Often in Indian films, supporting cast members are not given much attention and hate to say it, but often they tend to be really bad. There was a nice balance in this movie. No one ruined it. :-) Kudos to Durgesh Kumar, Pradeep Nagar, and Saharsh Kumar Shukla.

Music. Not too much, not too little. A.R. Rahman. How can you go wrong? I loved the soundtrack and will definitely buy it.

This movie is a rare gem. It is deep as it is beautiful. The images and emotions it evokes are haunting. It resonates just on every level. The characters linger with you for a long long time.

Salman working hard to reunite Hrithik and Suzanne… hmmm

According to One India reports, Salman selflessly reaches out to Hrithik to save the latter’s tattered marriage. So sweet. We all love Salman and Hrithik and of course Suzanne. We don’t want them to break up either. We still want to believe in marriage, afterall. Truly altruistic of Salman. Oh wait!

 

These twosies are working again on a film together, right? and we hear they are getting along famously.  Bang Bang. Snap Snap.

 

http://entertainment.oneindia.in/bollywood/news/2014/salman-khan-helps-to-reunite-hrithik-and-sussanne-132831.html

my cat behaves strange after watching Dhoom3

my autistic student, who loves all things Bollywood, interestingly enough, rejected trailers and songs. Usually he can’t get enough. Cat drives me mad.

Is there catnip in Dhoom3? We will get to the bottom of this! :-)

 

You know how your thoughts run wild during a movie? the same way as life flashes before your eyes when you die… my flashing thoughts were (not necessarily in that order..) Could it be that Uday Chopra mistook his role for Johnny Depp’s in Pirates of the Caribbean?…

Aamir. kabhi Ghajini face, kabhi My Name is Khan.

Aamir worked out really hard for this role. His body looks like out of steel. I don’t want to sound mean but all these protein shakes gave him man boobs.

The production team worked really hard on camouflaging differences of height between Katrina and Aamir. On frames where they stood next to each other, Aamir probably stood on a ladder.

Locations must have cost a FORTUNE, sets too. Costumes were splendid, except for Katrina in baby jumper and shapeless floppy hat. Thank Goodness she started stripping right away. Best.I loved the willowy lemony dress but it got hardly any showtime.

Also,talking about our heroine, they forgot to write a role for Katrina… really, what was her role? c’mon, Bollywood writer boys, you can do better…!

I am mocking and mocking, but I was wildly entertained watching Dhoom3. Not a dull moment. Movie went by so fast. 3 hours in a flash, you couldn’t fall asleep even if you tried.

Ending was tres (accent grave)  Dil Se.

Shekhar Kapur’s “Paani”

Paani means Water, which many of us take for granted, our most precious resource worth more than gold and diamonds together, takes center-stage in the utopian tale of “Paani”, Shekhar Kapur’s new cinematic (ad)venture. We heard about it way back in 2010. Rumors had it that Hrithik Roshan was playing the lead role. But we hear now it has been assigned to Sushant Singh Rajput, tant bien.

Wars have been and are being fought over water since centuries. Ever since we started dividing fertile lands. Cities are built around bodies of water. Colonizing any part of the world had to do with retaining and maximizing water resources. Our bodies are made of mainly water. Without water there wouldn’t be any human history, period.

Why are we so wasteful and careless with this greatest of all resources? Polluting industries, household chemicals,  farming practices are all culprits; the toxic chemicals, we pollute our earth with,  sooner or later will backfire, either through natural progression and their cumulative effects or acts of terrorism and war that are going to target water supplies directly or indirectly. It looks like we are doomed.Deep inside us lives that fear, even though we carry on in blissful denial.

Of all our bills, our water bill is the most modest monthly deduction. I consider myself very lucky having unlimited access. Do you?  You probably will, too, after watching Shekhar Kapur’s upcoming movie, which takes place in the future in a world doomed by water shortages. A war is triggered – in good archaic style, by two young lovers.

I hope with this movie, ShekharKapur is going to rattle our consciousness as he did 1994 with Bandit Queen, a movie etched into the memory of anyone who has seen it. Paani is going to be a movie opening on a grand scheme for sure, set to be released in IMAX theaters across the country, promising us to feel its heartbeat like we haven’t experienced it before in Indian film.

Please, Mr. Shekhar, don’t relegate the water issue into a background score, though. I am already glad, in a way,  to hear Hrithik Roshan is not going to be the main lead, cuz this would turn Paani into just another Hrithik-movie and its message would probably get ‘lost in romance’, or action or both. By signing a younger, less famous actor the focus will hopefully be the story itself, its focus on What IF….

 

 

Read up on Shekhar Kapur’s extraordinary filmography:

Shekhar Kapur bio and filmography

 

Countdown to November 15th: Ram Leela

 

Unconfirmed news of Ranveer Singh and Deepika Padukone’s dating popping up at every corner. The boy keeps busy, eh? That’s good news. The better and more important thing is, after watching the trailer we are all hyped up over Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s new film “Ram Leela”, which promises to score high on every Bollywood entertainment value. A hot hero, a cool heroine, a grand masala of action and romance: YES. That’s what we Bollywood aficionados are waiting for all year long. And it’s coming to hit us November 15th.

How do we know it’s going to be a spectacular movie? Easy. Sanjay Bhansali is a seasoned director/writer and producer. Whatever this magician touches starts to glow. His sets are lavish, exuberant, his actors inspired and becoming bigger versions of themselves.

Khamoshi: The Musical 1996

Straight From the Heart 1999

Devdas 2002

Black 2005

Saawariya 2007

Guzaarish 2010

 

 

 

 

 

PS, Dear Mr. Sanjay Leela Bansali

I could never forgive you  though the tremendous faux pas in Straight From the Heart. Filming in Budapest, using famous landmarks, whatsmore, and pretending it’s Italy… where we see mostly blond people strolling around in Lederhosen!!! supposed to be Milano? sorry but yeh Italy main nahi hai….  nor do we wear Lederhosen. Try Armani.

 

 

Okay, I got it finally off my chest :-) it’s been bothering me for years

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shruti Haasan’s day in the sun

Shruti Haasan is finally back in Bollywood, and with two releases! I saw her last in the movie Luck (2009). The movies wasn’t  impressive, but Shruti had touched me. It was her first major role, and I thought to myself what a pity her debut was overshadowed by a mess of a movie, poorly written and executed. She showed promise tho, I thought,  and then I hadn’t heard about her anymore. Not that she hadn’t been active.  She is also a singer and a composer, and she appeared in a few South Indian movies, (those that hardly ever get shown here in the US).She had a small role in Bhandarkar’s movie Dil Toh Baccha Hai Ji. But nothing commensurate with her talent.

Shruti had some corrective cosmetic surgery done, more plainly: a nose-job, but surely the size of a nose doesn’t determine if one can act or not. And acting she can! She is sublime. There is an ethereal quality to her. Her eyes are magnetic. She has a wonderful screen presence. I haven’t seen Ramaiya Vastavaiya but I saw D-Day yesterday. And again, she stood out and left a mark as Suraiya, victim of abuse, turned prostitute. There is some stillness in her amongst the turmoil of the unfolding story. Again, it’s her performance that touched me. The eloquence of her eyes, her voice. I love this girl. I am almost tempted to watch Ramayia Vastavaiya, in spite of the negative reviews.  I would watch it just for her.

Born into an elite acting household, daughter of legendary South Indian actor Kamal Hassan and Sarika Thakur,actress in her own rights, she must have eaten filmi rootis for breakfast every day. She was probably immersed in all aspects of film from an early age on. As a matter of fact, I learned, she started out as a singer.

Read up more about her on her Wiki page..wiki/ Shruti Haasan

 

I hope we are going to see more of her in the future!

Real-life Bollywood love triangles: prem kahanis gone south, kismet.

Happily (N)ever After. For some…

Bollywood actors are writing the best but  sometimes also the saddest love stories themselves.

Amitabh, Jaya and Rekha.

A prem kahani anthology of Bollywood actors is long overdue. Just off my mind, there is dashing young Amitabh Bachchan, Jaya and Rekha… Jaya won. Happily married. Two kids and a couple of grandchildren later, they will not even remember what all the emotional fuzz was about…. Rekha, on the other hand, probably will.

Mahesh Bhatt, Lorraine Bright and Parveen Babi.

Bhatt opened up about his tragic love story in a revealing interview  in 2006:

…….”Nostalgia is pain. The day Parveen died, I realised that despite the claims I made to myself, her memory had not withered within me with the passage of time.”

Talking about her illness he said: “Praveen’s breakdown is an old story. But I wonder if anyone could imagine what it is like to live with a person who is going mad.

“The morning I left Parveen’s house before it all began comes back to haunt me. She was off to her shoot for Prakash Mehra’s film… and she kissed me good-bye. Little did I know that it was the last time I would see her as the Parveen that I knew.

“How can I ever forget that heartbreaking image of her, when I walked in to the house that evening, and found Parveen, in make up and a filmy costume, cowering in a corner, with a knife in her hand, shivering with fear?

“She looked like an animal, one that I had never seen before. ‘Close the door Mahesh,’ she whispered. ‘They are coming to kill us. Close the door quickly!’

“And with those words ended my days of love and splendour, sin and passion with Parveen. I was looking into the eyes of madness and the face of death. Because the person that I knew had died, and with that our relationship, as we had known it, died too.”

read more here: interview with mahesh bhatt on santabanta.com

Obviously, this was too great of a burden for his relationship with wife Lorraine.
Guru Dutt, Geeta  and Waheeda Rehman

Kaagaz Ke Phool (1959) starring, Guru Dutt, Waheeda Rehman, singer Geeta Dutt

Pyaasa (1957) starring Guru Dutt,  Waheeda Rehman, singer: Geeta

This love triangle turned deadly for the extraordinary filmmaker and actor Guru Dutt, who died of an overdose or suicide at age 39. His wife Geeta died a few years later at age 41.

Waheeda prevailed, she got out of this unhappy relationship unscathed, it seems and married later on, had two children. She remains the grand dame of Indian film until today, beautiful as ever.

Dev Anand, the romantic hero of the 40s and 50s, his romance with Suraiya, his marriage to Kalpana.

Not so much a love triangle because I believe that his relationship with Suraiya had ended before he fell in love with the equally ravishing Kalpana.  This story ended bad for Suraiya, as she was Muslim and her grandmother would not allow her to get married to a Hindu. A secret on-set wedding was planned, but Suraiya got cold feet. The relationship broke and the beautiful actress tragically made good on her promise to then never get married. Dev and Kalpana on the other hand seemed to have built a wonderful life together until death parted them in 2011 when Dev passed away.

Dev and Kalpana, Nau Do Gyrah,1957

Dev and Suraiya, Shair, 1949

Yeah. Love is a powerful drug. Anything is fair in love and war. Isn’t that the saying?

Run to see Milkha Run

Once you get to the theater,  you can relax. The movie is 3 hours long. Even long by Bollywood standards,  but you will discover you got the stamina of a long-distance runner. There is not a dull moment in this heartfelt biopic. Farhan Akhtar delivers a lifetime performance as yesterday’s Olympian sprinter and sports sensation Milkha Singh.

For preparing for this role alone he deserves an Oscar. And probably his trainer should get one too.  And OmPrakash Om. Accolades to the director of the movie.

Rakeyesh Omprakash Mehra, who gave us Rang De Basanti and Delhi-6,  has validated himself again as one of the  best contemporary directors of Indian cinema.

The movie had an excellent supporting cast.Sometimes it’s a weakness of Bollywood productions not to give enough weight to the supporting cast. This one was superbly chosen. Kudos to the casting director and team.

Sonam Kapoor had a relatively small but important role, as Biro, Milkha’s first love. However, she vanishes too fast, never to be seen again. I would have preferred to get a glimpse of her whereabouts to get a sense of closure. And even if it was just seeing her ONCE cry watching her sweetheart-lost on TV… :-)

I wish the movie had some live-footage  at the end, and donning us with a little bit of Milkha Singh info before the rolling credits. So, first thing I did after coming home was reading up on Milkha Singh. (Farhan really looks a little bit like him).

wikipedia page Milkha Singh

link for Ibn interview: Milkha Singh on Milkha Singh

Ship of Theseus

I hope this ship aka movie is going to make it to US shores.

MAMI review of Ship of Theseus

Ship of Theseus, Wikipedia