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I love to watch dubbed movies. Though my English is fair enough, but sometimes it is difficult for me to understand pronunciation of foreign actors as they do not open their whole mouth while speaking (unlike our hindi actors do….). and I don’t want to imagine what the actor is saying.

It is also interesting listen desi version of English dialogues and titles. As per my knowledge, Jurassic Park was first official dubbed movies but the title was kept same then there were lots of movies whose titles were more interesting or pathetic than the movie itself.

So I have found some interesting dubbed hindi titles of foreign movies….may be you enjoy….

* Dear or alive- Karo ya maro
* Pirates of Caribbean- Curse of black pearl-Samunder ke lootere
* Dead man’s chest- Murde ka khazana
* At world’s end- Antim ghadi
* The bone collector- Khatarnak qatil (imagine the word to word translation…????)
* …

There is nothing new coming in my life of movies. It was the time when I used to watch 1-2 movies a day and now it is turned to hardly 1 movie in 15 days. Because of work pressure and family engagements, I find little time to watch movies and sometimes, for a little time I am listening music on my mobile phone. And I am surprised with load of 70s music I am also listening some of the good songs of 90s.

So i have come up with some of my favourite 90s hindi movies’ songs:
you can add some more… if u wish..

*Vada raha sanam- Khiladi
*Pani pani re- maachis
*Dil hai chhota sa- Roja
*Dhadkan jara ruk gayi hai- Prahaar
*Baat kya hai kaise keh de tumse raaj ki- Chor aur chand
*Tum kya mile jaan e jan- ssatwa aasman
*Pehla nasha- Jo jeeta wohi sikandar
*Jumma chumma de de- Hum
*Tu na ja …

Reasons- Why I liked Satya?????

1998-It was my 2nd year in engineering and as every hostel guy I was seeing lots of movies. I was testing new flavour of hollywod cinema staring from Jurassic park to commando to titanic to home alone and lots more. I also enjoyed Pyar to hona hi tha, Ghulam in monsoon of 1998. But unfortunately I missed the gem “satya”. Though I knew that it was a great movie by my one of the favourite -Ramgopal verma, the trailers did not aroused me to see it. While in December, when I was roaming on scooter and saw poster of satya on theatre, I immediately got into cinema hall. And one of the greatest movie experiences started. When I get out of cinema hall I was completely in the movie. I was trying to get out of the effect of the Bhiku mhatre, vidya and satya.,..but for …

I AM LEGEND: THE BOOK AND THE FILM

Recently, watched I am legend. A good+bad film. Those who have not read the original novel by Richard Matheson can find the film good. But I have read the book. So I found the film little dissatisfying.

The makers have taken lots of cinematic liberties that they have changed premise and changed characters. Why filmmakers can do anything in the name of cinematic liberty?

The novel dealt more with psychological status of Robert Neville. While the film is more concentrated on special effects and showing empty Newyork city. What was the need of showing lions and deers in Newyork city?

Also the novel explains some scientific as well as super natural reasons for people being infacted and being zombies’ type of creatures. Here there is no satisfying reason for infection. I also missed the Courtman and his signature line ‘Robert Naville, come …

THE INDIAN COWBOYS
Can you remember those- horses, boots, hats, jeans, jackets, pistols and above all tall and dark guy with half shaved beard- the cowboy?
Recently No country for old men refreshed those memories associated with cowboys and their culture. While watching that flick; Indian (specilly hindi) movie cowboys came into my mind. Most of them existed in 70s and 80s and have not seen since long time.

They were basically inspired from Clint eastwood, Gregory pack and all other those once upon a time movie cowboys of hollywood. But our cowboys had qualities of those cowboys with essential benefits or qualities of Indian culture. Like western cowboys they used to ride on horses, wear boots, jeans and shooting bullets like playing with toys… but could also dance and sing very well, must fall in love with village girl etc etc. Most of our good cowboys had Daku or Thakur/zameendar …

BACKGROUND SCORES IN HINDI MOVIES

As hindi movies are full of songs, the music directors and film makers do not concentrate on background music. Hindi movies are not giving as much importance as foreign movies are giving. Somehow trends are changing. Now our technically confident directors and music directors take background score in consideration while planing the scenes.

In 80s and 90s there were some readymade tunes which filmmakers/music directors used to play for particular scene like comedy, chase, tragedy, love, action etc.

One of the frequently used tune was used in Ghayal for opening sequence in jail….

In early 90s directors straightly lifted background scores of Hollywood movies for ex. Mohra- When sunil shetty is fighting with other prisoners in jail…then background score is lifted from Terminator’s signature tune.

As we know sometimes background score plays more important role than dialogues. Background score can enhance effect of scene and overall movie. …

RAMCHAND PAKISTANI-another from new age Pakistani cinema

After Khuda Kay liye, Pakistani films seem to be more interesting. In next few days, there is another gem “Ramchand Pakistani” is coming.

The movie is about a dalit hindu family living in border area of Pakistan. During the time of kargil war; a man and his son from this family; accidentally cross the border and goes to India, where they are captured by army as supposed to be Jasoos of Pakistan. And then there are consequences due to India Pakistan relations at that time. Story is also focused on status of a woman whose husband and son is captured in India. Wife’s character is played by talented Indian actress “Nandita Das”. Other actors Rashid Farooqui, Syed Fazal etc. are not much known to us.

I have not seen this film so I can’t say much. Gujarati daily Gujarat Samachar has published an article …

FULMARXX-Short films’ festival- 2nd day, 2nd session.

I thought somebody would cover this event. I waited but nothing happened. So here i am giving some details on fulmarxx. Friends, I am not a journalist so I have no experience of covering events. I am giving some details and my random thoughts on Fulmarxx- short films festival organized by MICA-EDC on 26-27th april, 2007 at Ahmedabad. This post is as per viewer's eye.

I wanted to catch whole event, but due to my personal and professional commitments; I watched only last session of fulmarxx short film festival. The Last session featured full shorts which had duration around 45 minutes.

1. Mid-shot (hindi)- It was about principles of Gandhiji and Nathuram Godsay and its relation to today's world. I liked it because of its pace, editing and music.

2. Kachra (hindi/telugu). The story is about street boys, a girl and child abusement. Concept …

Random thoughts on “NAMKEEN” (1982)

Caution: Spoilers Ahead

This is not a review kind of article but describes my random feelings and thoughts while and after watching Namkeen. Kartik has written an article on Namkeen but I must share my thoughts about this gem, – you have to tolerate this. Pardon me if some lines match with kartik’s article but this would be genuine as we all have same feelings about cinema.

So Namkeen is a story about a truck driver and his relation with four women residing in a remote Himachal village. Truck driver Gerulal (Sanjeev Kumar) decides to rent a house in a village where house owner is a family consisting of an old woman (Waheeda Rehman) and her three daughters(Nimki-Sharmila Tagore, Mithu-Shaban Azmi, Chinki-Kiran Vairale). Then their relation develops and Gerulal is thinking to marry elder sister Nimki. But as his work contract expires he has to go …

RAWNESS IN HINDI MOVIES

There were movies in 80s and early 90s which can be defined as rough movies. These films had rawness in their treatment. Those movies were not sophisticated, not stylish. Here director does not want to impress you by stylish action, weared camera angles, soft music…but had only story, action & dialogues.

Story is situated mainly Mumbai or small town- …. The hero and his team of unemployed youth, neglected by society….one gang leader/politician… gang war…something happens…hero and his team/family is in trouble…they fight against system… and at the end they go to jail or return back to social life.

There were some particular qualities/symptoms of these movies like…

Here protagonists mainly fight with hockey sticks, talwar, rampuri chakoos and cycle chains…and in rare case revolver…

They live in the world of majdoors, workers, bekaars, scooters, union leaders, goons, maruti omnis, fiats, jeeps, chai ki dukan, canteens…

Love between hero and heroine …

1971- Simply Superb!

When I was a kid; I used to like watching Ramayan, Alif Laila, Krishna and all those stuff made by Sagar brothers. But at the same time; I did not like their terrible technical ignorance and over over over the top acting. Can you imagine a camel cart with rubber tyres in age of Alif Laila or that typical hindi filmy back ground music in Ramayan. In 60s and 70s, Ramanad Sagar made some good movies like Geet, Charas and Aankhein. But after that Sagar brothers made aweful movies and serials with pathetic technicalities, over the top dramatic performances and cheap budget. They made a film on Bhagat singh and the opening sequence was of a jail. And can u believe they show animated version of jail in a live action film.

But new generation of Sagar Family seems to be more knowledgeable than their previous. 1971 is …

10,000 B.C. – A Children Film

I did not expect anything great in 10,000 B.C. and the movie is exactly like that. It has good special effects and CGI but thin story line.

As we had seen in past; director Roland Emmerich is known to put his hero in larger than life unusual difficult situation (independence day, the day after tomorrow…)…here he puts his hero in the world before 10,000 years of Christ’s existence. But that is the only thing which makes us interested in the movie. Then there are special effects, fights and exotic locations. That’s all about 10,000 B.C.

The promos seemed to be quite interesting and I expected the life, the culture and the habits in 10,000 B.C. But the movie is not concentrated in those details. Hero is searching for his love; that has …

VANTAGE POINT: a brief note

Caution: Spoilers Ahead

Vantage point is about assassination of American president and the coverage of this incident by eye of eight different people.

Before interval film shows incident with respect to a body guard, a tourist, a policeman, a terrorist, a suicide bomber, a little girl, a killer and a second body guard.

Concept and plot is good and for half of the film it maintains interest. But after creating interest when the film messes up with typical high dose hollywood action; it reasonably fails. When the film appears to be a mind exercising thriller; immediately it turns out to be formula one race. If the medium pace of film was maintained throughout the film then it might turned out to be a good suspense thriller. And suspense??? An average experienced English moviegoer can easily guess the suspense.

…

HISTORICAL HEROES…WAITING TO BE ADOPTED ON SCREEN.

While watching Jodha Akbar; a thought came into mind- why all the time Indian film makers focuses on love story while adopting history characters. E.g. Ashoka- Santosh Shivan focused on love story between Ashoka and kaurvki. Sanjay leela bhansali planned to make historical film on love story of Baajirao and Mastani.

Latest Jodha Akbar also focused on love story. Many of us found that there was not enough masala/content in the film. There was thin storyline in the film.

India has produced lots of heroes in the history. Their personality and life can be great source for film. But nobody plans to adopt these big historical characters which are symbols of courage, spirit and patriotism. We can make our own Brave heart, or Gladiator. I think our past film makers were more ready to take challange to portray histroy on silver screen. I still …

NAYAK (2001)- SHANKAR AT HIS BEST

I like larger than life movies. I love movie with all commercial masala in it. But condition is that it should be well balanced. It should have fast pace, powerful dialogues, performances and excellent technique. Nayak-The Real Hero fulfills all those expectations. It is intense, emotional as well as humorous and fast paced.

Shankar has got grip in handling true commercial movies. I have seen his Hum se hai Muqabla, Gentleman, Hindustani and Aparichit. (All dubbed in hindi). Though all of his films have almost same story (a common man fighting against corrupt system by having special power); he treats the subject differently and make audience engaged in the film as well as enjoy the film.

As per my POV Nayak-The Real Hero is Shankar’s best work till date. The major difference and innovative …

HALLA BOL- Mr. Santoshi Delivers What Is Expected

Director: Rajkumar Santoshi
Writer: Rajkumar Santoshi

Overall Grading: B+

Halla Bol is a typical Rajkumar Santoshi film having witty and powerful dialogues, dramatic sequences, good performances and an item song.

Halla Bol is about a film star’s awakening of inner soul and fight against system (
as usual in santoshi’s films). Story is not innovative and it is predictable but it is santoshi’s treatment that makes you engaged tin the film. Film is stretched before interval and after interval director tries to complete film in hurry. There are some ridiculous things like – a girl selling her kidney for her sister’s case, minister with his goons giving warning to Sameer Khan in court campus etc etc but it is Rajkumar Santoshi’s capability to handle the subject that we take these ridiculous things for granted. May be that is the difference between Rajkumar Santoshi and Guddu Dhanoa. Also …

SOMETHING GOOD ON TV

1. If you want to show your expensive glazed bathroom tiles without inviting anybody at your home; just get a dead cockroach in your bathroom & contact INDIA TV or any Indian news channel – I am sure that Mr. Sharma will cover your dead cockroach as “BREAKING NEWS”.

2. If you have capability to get tears without glycerin; just take part in any singing or dancing competition on any channel; I am sure you would be able to sustain for minimum 2 rounds.

3. If you are not bored with repeated watching of movies Garv-Pride & Honour, Hungamaa, Naayak, Gangaajal, Maalamal Weekly, No Entry, Sarkar….just go to Set Max, Sahara One or Zee cinema. You would get revision of your movies.

4. If you want …

WELCOME -full of nonsense

Overall grading: B-
Director: Anees Bazmee

Pehaps after success of No Entry director Anees Bazmee thought “chalo No Entry hit hui hai to usi type ki ek aur comedy banate hai”. Let’s take love story of Gangster’s sister and an average boy. OK concept is good but then what? How to develop script? OK… add some songs picturised in Dubai, South Africa, Take big star cast Add illogical comedy sequences, poor jokes …. And most important constatnt TV campaning…. Ek baar public ne ticket kharid li to wapas to nahin karegi… aur.film dekhke medical store waalon (Asprin) ko bhi thodi kamaai ho jaaye to thoda bahot commission bhi pakka… So he made WELCOME.

Yes I know we should not try to find any logic in a comedy movie….but welcome is illogical as well as full of nonsense. Welcome has that kind of nonsense that can not be tolerated …

AANCH (2003) – CLOSE TO COUNTRY SIDE

Aanch (2003) is the story of two lovers caught between fake egos and cultural rules of villages. It is an unusual story and perhaps based on a true incident. The story takes place in two of the UP villages. A boy (played by Suchindra Bali-son of veteran actress Vaijayanti Mala) and a girl (played by Sharbani Mukerjee- who played Suniel shetty’s wife in Border) are engaged and their marriage is arranged. Suchindra is from the village where Paresh Rawal is leader while Nana Patekar is leader of Sharbani’s village. At wedding night people of both villages fight because of a past dispute. Some are killed and just married couple is forcefully separated. The interesting note is that both bride and groom have not seen each other’s face as it is usually happens in indian villages. Separately Suchindra and Sharbani go to city for study …

AAJA NACHLE- Madhuri strikes back

Director: Anil Mehta

Overall Grading: B

“Madhuri Dixit” strikes back with Aaja Nachle. This is Madhuri’s come back film after interval of 5 years (Devdas-2002).

Aaja Nachle’s story is about a theatre called “Ajanta” and a dancer, her feelings about Ajanta and how she manages to stop Ajanta’s demolition. Story background is different but basic idea is same like team building, internal clash in team, and one goal for team etc etc. which were seen in Lagaan, Chek De India and recent Goal.

Madhuri is central character in the film and after long time a hard core commercial film having female lead has come; which is appreciable. Her presence in every scene is the main attraction. She manages her performance well but looks thin as compared to her earlier films like Tezaab, Beta…. in which she was healthy beauty. Others Kunal Kapoor, Jugal Hanshraj are …

IN MUMBAI

Please bare with my knowledge of grammer and tenses.

It’s around 5.30 in the morning. I am opening door of my train compartment. Sudden fishy smell captures my nose. The particular Mumbai smell… I have come to Mumbai for an official work. I will spend four whole days in this dream city. Though before this I have visited Mumbai two times but this time I am more mature and more filmy to understand Mumbai.

So now Mumbai is about to reach.. I am seeing boards of Nai gaon, , Mira Road, Dahisar etc etc. Also seeing halogen bulbs images in the water from my train. The tall buildings, bastis, roads, rickshaws are looking so different in the early morning halogen bulbs. I can’t remember any film maker has captured beauty of mumbai’s early morning…. People are still in their houses. Borivali station comes Train stops. I have to land …

JAAGO MOHAN PYAARE!

“It is very easy to criticise anyone’s work than doing the actual work”.

The old and experienced players of hindi cinema…started their career by redefining the rules of typical bollywood film making. But some how lost their golden touches, cinematic abilities, and trapped in their own success and intelligence. They are thinking they are making right stuff and are with new generation of film making. But they might don’t know there are many dark horses trying to make films in their own way and if so called genius film makers would not wake out from dreams,…. they might go for long sleep.

* J.P. DUTTA- started with bang- Ghulami. But confined in his own brilliance. Prisoned in desert, thakurs and revenges(Batwaara, Kshatriya). Somehow reborn in Border but again captured in the same prison of long songs, wars and cross border issues. Umrao Jaan was like doordarshan serial. Though his …

REMEMBERING… AMRISH PURI

It was one sentence in the post of George Thomas on Dhaal “It is with Pilot Baba that this film strikes gold” made me desperate to think and write about Amrish Puri.

Very few actors have that capability that when they come on screen, then concentration of audience immediately shift to them. You forget the opposite actor; your eyes ignore other actors and just concentrate on that particular actor. Amrish Puri was such an actor.

I have grown up watching Amrish Puri’s films, seeing him as bad guy and then turning to loving father and grand father. Whenever I used to surf channels, and if I come to see Amrish Puri, I just can not escape that scene. He is one of the my all time favourite actors of hindi cinema.

If 60s was the …

JOHNNY GADDAR-MY STORY

This is not a professional review, just my feelings after watching Johnny Gaddar.

It was 10 am in the Sunday morning and I was talking to my cousin on phone “ chal yaar film dekhne chalet hai.” He asked” Kaunsi?” I said” Johnny Gaddar”…. “koi English film hai kya?”…. “ nahin re, hindi film hai par achchi hai aur suspense thriller hai”. He asked “who are the actors?” I replied “Dharmendra and a new hero called Niel Nitin Mukesh with Rimi sen” he laughed. But somehow I managed to convince him for the movie.

Now it was 2.45 pm in afternoon and we were at theatre. There was no poster of Johnny Gaddar. Only posters of Dhol and Dhamaal were seen. I asked for ticket” the ticket person asked “which film?” I said “Johnny Gaddar” “you are the first person who asks …

GEMS REVISITED

Doston, peechle hafte hindi cinema ki teen anmol ratan jaisi movies dekhne ka mauka mila. Waise pehle bhi kai baar in movies ko dekh chooka hoon, par jitni baar dekhta hoon, kuchh naya sikhta hoo, kuchh naya paata hoon , aur in filmo ke prati mera aadar aur badh jaata hai.

1.Dosti (1964)

Do doston ki kahaani. Ek andha hai aur ek handicapped (played by Sushil and Sudhir Kumar). Zindagi jeene ke sangarsh me apni jarooraton ke peeche chalte huye ek doosre se milte hai. Aur phir shoroo hoti hai ek doosre ke prati chahat aur qurbani ki kahani. Jarrorato ke liye ekththa huye dost kaise apne bare me sochna chhodke apne dost ki unnati ke baare me sochne lagte hai- yehi hai Dosti ki kahanni. Haan, film me 60s ki stamped melodrama acting maujood hai par shaayad woh …

MEMORIES OF MOVIES

We all have some special memories for special days or special incidents. As we all are movie lovers, we must have some sweet or special memories associated with particular movies. In this post I am going to share some of sweet memories of films. The films and memories mentioned in post may not be great and I will not discuss their merits and demerits but whenever I read or watch about those particular movies some special memories always come in mind immediately.

DILWALA- In 1986-87 when I was 7-8 years old, one evening after whole day’s tiring job my father decided to go for a movie. As my mother was busy with some house hold work he decided to go alone. I heard the conversation and decided I would go along with him. My father lured me by giving chocolate that I would not go with him but I …

MY THOUGHTS ON PASSION FOR CINEMA

As PFC is going to be 1 year old soon, here are my random thoughts on PFC.

One day in March-2007, while searching on net about one of my favorite directors- Mukul S. Anand, I found a superb article by our dear OZ. The site was desitrain.com and through that site I entered in the family of passion for cinema. Continuously for a week I read lot on PFC and found that I am not only passionate about cinema but there are lots of people like me. I am not the only one who always thinks about movies, there are lot paagals or majnoos of movies like me. I wrote to OZ and asked for invitation to write and luckily there were not too many authors at that time so I got invitation and PFC became medium for me to express my thoughts about cinema which …

Caution: Don’t expect too much stylish English.

RAJKUMAR SANTOSHI-”SAABASH MERE CHITEY!”

When did the last time you get the effect of drinking Glucon D? Your blood got hot? Released lots of Adrenalin in your body?….. Perhaps after watching A RAJKUMAR SANTOSHI MOVIE.

There is lots of energy and dhaka dhak high speed involved in his films that you can not close your eyes for a second or could not get chance of escaping for popcorn or toilet.

Rajkumar Santoshi is a director who does not care about his films’ box office results. He follows his heart and makes convincing message oriented and entertaining films in typical Bollywood format and so is one of the my favorite directors after Hrishida and Gulzarsaab and shares same slot with Mukul S. Anand, Vijay Anand etc.

As per my knowledge, he is son …

Caution: Terrible mix of Hindi and English.

CASH
Director: Anubhav Sinha
Overall Grading: B-

Rajiv Masand (CNN IBN- now showing) told me, PFC and news papers warned me, even one of my film lover friend messeged me ”CASH” is bakwaas. Par saala filmi kida dimaag me aisa gusa hua hai ki log to bolte rahenge jab tak mein khood dekh na lu tab tak kaise pata chalega ki Cash vakai me bakwaas hai.

Cash dekhne ke baad pata chala ki kabhi kabhi public ki baton ko bhi maan lena chahiye. Duniya me hum akele hi filmelligent (film + intelligent) nahin hai.

Cash starts with mast song and I thought that why people always …

Caution: Terrible mix of Hindi and English.

Hindi filmone desh aur videsh me bahot bada maqaam haasil kar liye hai. Aaj hindi filmo ki oonchi imaarat jo hum dekh rahe hai usme bahot saari chhoti chhoti intein (bricks) lagi huyi hain. Isme se ek int nikal jaaye to imaarat ko kuchh jyaada farq nahi padega par inhi sab inton ki vajah se yeh imaarat aaj itni badi aur majboot hai.

Yeh sab inte hai hindi filmo ke character actors. Nahi mein Pran, Omprakash, Nirupa roy jaise famous character actors ki baat nahi kar raha. Unhe to sab jaante hai par aaj unki baat karni hai jo hamein poorani filmo me har doosri film me nazar aate hai par unhe hum notice nahi karte hai. Unki tasveer hum dekhe to ek hi second me pehchaan lete hai par unka naam hum nahi jaante. Barso tak unhone hero ya heroine ke baap, …

IQBAL- THE DOP

Chetavani: yeh post jise achchhi lagegi use bahot achhi lagegi aur jise kharaab lagi woh to chahenge ki main likhna hi chhood du. To kripya is post ko padhne se pehle do baar soch le.

After reading Santosh Sivan’s superb post on his journey to cinematography and watching Iqbal last night, the thought came in my dream(it is fact) that instead of cricketer if Iqbal wants to be a cinematographer then what would be the story?
__________

Iqbal ka background Nagesh Kukunoor ki iqbal jaisa hi hai. Woh ek kisaan ka beta hai aur apni maa, chhoti behan aur baba ke saath ek chhote se gaanv(village) me rehta hai. Jaisa iqbal me dikhaya gaya hai woh sun nahin sakta hai par isaaron se aur honth(lips) ki movement dekhke sab samaj sakta hai.

Opening scene me cricket match ki jagah iqbaal ki maa black & white TV pe film Sholay …

NAQAAB-DISGUISED INTENTIONS

Director: Abbas Mustan

Karan(Bobby Deol) and Sophia (Urvashi Sharma) live together as friends and lovers in big house of Karan. After a song with bambaiyaa romance, Sophiya falls in love with Vicky(Akshay Khanna). Vicky is working for a man called Rohit who forces him to be in love with Sophia. During whole film somebody catching romance of Sophia and Vicky through cameras. When karan knows about their affair he becomes angry and instead of killing Sophia / Vicky, he kills himself. Then what happens? For whom Vicky was working? Why Karan kills himself? For these answers you should see NAQAAB.

In past, Abbas Mustan had succeeded to create suspense thriller in pure hindi films style (of course inspired from some English flick like Daraar- sleeping with enemy, Aetraaz- Disclosure etc..) They give entertaining thrillers for both mass and class.

Naqaab is abbas mustan’s latest thriller. The promos and poster claims the …

CHAMELI KI SHAADI (1986) – A COMIC LOVE STORY

Basu Chatterjee is known for his light hearted films and most of them were very good. Chemeli ki shaadi is his one of the lesser known films of his career but a film worth to watch.

Chameli ki shaadi is light hearted comic love story and is all about love of small town boy and girl, how they meet, how their love progresses and how their marriage happens.

Charandas is a small town young boy who is fond of Kasrat and pehalvani (exercise and body building). His guru Mastram (Om Prakash) takes promise from charandas that he would not fall in love and not marry till the age of 40, because he believes that woman is the gate of hell (aurat nark ka dwaar hai). But Charandas and Chameli fall in love with each other at first sight. Then the difficulties arise. The …

DOORDARSHAN- DOWN MEMORY LANE

Yes, I know this site is for cinema only, but Doordarshan is the birth place of some of the todays successful personalities of Indian cinema so Let myself be 10 years old and get back to late 80s and early 90s- the era of Doordarshan. The one and only daily entertainment dose of every Indian.
Lets check out some goods and bads of Doordarshan and our memory power.

Most of the serials were of 13 episodes and so people were associated with character for 2-3 months and it made more concentrated and sensible serials.

- Ramayan and Mahabharat- how can we mention doordarshan without Ramayan and Mahabharat? Literally there was Curfew like situation on Sunday mornings when these two epics were telecasted. These serials made life of Arun Govil (Ram), Mukesh Khanna (Bhisma), Punit issar (duryodhan), Rupa Ganguli (Draupadi) , Dipilka(Sita) etc.. Though technically poor, these two serials …

SARFAROSH (1999) – ORIGINAL AND AWESOME

Perhaps all of PFC guys have shown this superb film but I want to discuss this film as this film has impressed me lot with respect to story telling, griping script, dialogues, characters, performances and music.

Sarfarosh was John Mathew Mathan’s first film after making ads and in his first film he seems to be prominent director of hindi cinema. Let’s discuss this film by its qualities

Story: The first rule of cinema is it should be entertaining. The good message attached with it is secondary thing. Sarfarosh is entertaining as well it conveys the message of patriotism which writer and director want to say. The story has superb balance of qualities of commercial cinema as well as off beat cinema.

Story deals with exposure of weapons racket supported by ISI and our in-house terrorists. Film starts with mass killing and loot of passengers by some south …

PIRATES OF CARIBBEAN- AT WORLD’S END

Director: Gore Verbinski
Overall Grading: B

Here is third and last part of Pirates of Caribberan.

First part “The curse of Balck pearl” jitna achha aur entertaining tha utne hi boring 2nd part- Dead man’s chest aur third part “at world’s end” hai.

Haan, 3rd part 2nd part se thoda achha hai par jyaada kuchh nahi hai.

Story ko itna complicated kar diya hai ki kaun sa character kahaan se aake kahaan jaa raha hai pata hi nachi chalta. Itne saare naye aur purane characters hai ki kisi ek character ko bhi poori tarah ubharne ki jagah nahi mili hai. Elizabeth(Keira kightly), will tunrer (Orlando Bloom), Barbossa(Geoffrey Rush), Davy Jones(bill nighly) etc etc. koi bhi character apni adakari ka johar poori tarah se nahi dikha paata. Jiski wajah se pirates itni bahot blockbuster hui hai woh Jack Sparrow(Johnny Depp) ko bhi jyaada space nahi diya hai. Chow Yun Fat …

MOVIES AND REAL LIFE

Some days back, I saw an interview of Sudhir Mishra on Sahara Filmy by Mayank Shekhar. Mishraji told “Today’s film makers watch movies, not life” They are engaged in watching movies, discussing movies but they do not devote their time to watching, analyzing life. 100% correct.

Some so called biggest filmmakers claim their film’s connectivity to real life. They give very stylish, larger than life films. Making is stylish, larger than life films is not a bad thing. But their films do not connect with common man. Why?

Because…..
- They do not research properly for their films. They do not know minor rules of Indian culture like in Hindus, women do not go to shamshan for Agnisanskar. I have seen in many films by so called biggest filmmakers that women were present in shamshaan in a white cotton sarees.

- Human behavior (physical, mental, biological) is not properly analyzed. …

There is lots of discussion and arguments going about SAL. Some liked, some disliked. Finally I watched it to realize comments given by our PFC guys. Below is my opinion about the film. This is the review that I sent to my friends which are not passionate about cinema as we are. I have to review the film in simple language not too technical.

SHOOTOUT AT LOKHANDWALA

Director: Apoorva Lakhiya

Overall Grading: B+

Shoot out at Lokhandwala is a movie which tells the story of gangsters who were killed in a shootout in 1991 at Lokhandwala complex.

Produced by Sanjay Dutt, Sanjay Gupta and Balaji motion pictures, it has some good point as well as minus points.

This is director Apurva Lakhiya’s third film after Mumbai se aaya mera dost (2003), Ek Ajnabee(2005)( Copy of english “Man on fire”). SAL is better than his previous movies but not a great movie.

Performance wise Sanjay Dutt is …

Encounter-The killing was released in 2002 and forgotten. And most of people still don’t know that there is a film like this.
By the name people may think that this is B or C grade film containing usual police- gangsters’ saga. It had no big stars but had powerful performances, good script and story, dialogues and above all well defined characters and direction.

The story is like this: Inspector Bharucha (Naseeruddin Shah) ek encounter me 3-4 jawaan logo ko icccha na hote huye bhi circumstances ki wajah se maar daalte hai. Mare huye logi me se ek ki dead body ko lene ke loye koi aata nahi. Uska koi identification nahi hota hai. As per court rules the dead body has to be disposed after some specified time limit. As a good officer bharucha aur unki friend jo ek journalist hai (Tara Deshpande) time limit ko badhane ki koshish karte …

Whenever you read or heard “Is actor ne us actor ke performance ko us film me kaccha chaba liya hai” means one actor has overshadowed another actor’s performance. What do you thinks at that time? Is it failure of actor?

Sometimes it is true, sometimes it is questionable.

Take example of Agneepath(1990). It was truly Amitabh Bachchan’s film. But you can not ignore Mithun’s performance. You can not say that Mithun performed badly. This is Director’s success that he knows how to balance characters on the screen irrespective of the lengths of roles of respective actors.

Take another example Deewar (1975)- Amitabh performed very well but you can not say that he over shadowed Shashi Kapoor’s performance. Director and writer succeeded in balancing of characters. On the contrary, take example of Darr (1993) where Shahrukh Khan’s performance overshadowed Sunny Deol’s performance though both have same lengths of roles. After watching the film …

Here are some good movies which released in the 80s. (The era of smugglers, revenge stories with lower technicalities. The signing stars were Mithun, Jeetendra, Reena Roy, Anita Raaj, Vinod Khanna……)

These are not great movies but entertains you for 3 hours surely. Not having Mahel type homes, designer sarees and kurtas, disco theques…. but containing good dialogues, greeping scripts and overall good performances. These all are family dramas describing love, sacrifice, moral values, envy, hate, generation gap and small and big middle class problems.

Sansaar (1987):
Rekha, Raj Babbar, Anupam Kher Dir: T. Rama Rao

Remake of some south Indian film Story deals with the “Takraav” of father and son, less time and space for husband and wife to make love, comparison between sons, management of money etc. Highly dramatical situations with an unusual climax.

Saheeb (1985)
Anil Kapoor, Utpal Dutt, Rakhee Gulzar, Amrita Singh
Dir: Anil Gangooly

The story of sacrifice. Utpal …