Current week’s release – Ekk Deewana Tha.

It’s Gautam Vasudev Menon’s second hindi outing after Rehna hain tere dil mein, and is a remake of his own earlier versions - Ye Maaya Chesave (Telgu) &  Vinnaithaandi Varuvaayaa (Tamil) – both with different endings and are considered classics in the respective original version.

I’ve seen the Telgu version twice (yes twice, with English subtitles), and was bowled over by it when I first saw it….am gonna watch the hindi version too (please don’t make faces, I told you movies are my meditation).

Movie is a love story with an uncomplicated story line and an old world charm to it. Telgu version worked pretty well for me, despite the fact that I’m not a big fan of romantic genre. The highlight of the movie was its innocence and the sparkling chemistry between the lead pair of Naga Chaitanya & Samantha.

Let’s see how well have they remade it in hindi.

The songs by AR Rahman have been playing on the satellite channels for some time, but like other AR Rahman music take time in picking up though the Hossana number has become reasonably popular.

I recently saw the talkie trailers of the movie which look good, but in my opinion should have been started airing little earlier.

Overall, considering the level of promotion and the box-office standing of Prateik, movie will depend on its content and word of mouth.

I hope makers have retained the feel, simplicity and innocence of the original…..am eager to watch it at the earliest.

 Gagan

Disclaimer - Please refer to the earlier post under the heading of Introduction and Disclaimer.

Friday Releases – 16^th Feb’12

Continuing with my series where I express my opinion / expectation on the Friday releases as a movie goer.

Let’s take a quick look at last week’s release – Ek main or Ekk tu.

I was (once again) bang on with my prediction.

Movie was a perfect date flick, released at the appropriate time around Valentine, which indeed added on to the business aspect of the movie.

Movie is not exactly a rom-com, it’s a mix between a rom-com and coming-of-age, but the fun quotient is maintained throughout the movie, through the witty dialogues, style of narrative and the comic timing of the principal cast.

It’s probably one of the best performances of Imran Khan, his comic timing is great and goes well with his poker faced dialogue delivery. In this movie he has acted differently than his past few rom-coms, in a mould he has been getting type cast. In Indian film’s the character underplaying the role usually gets overshadowed by the other vivacious lead, while here surprisingly Imran holds himself well enough, so much so that when the movie ends it’s his character you take along…which goes to Imran’s credit.

Like his contemporary Ranbir Kapoor, he may not have done a Rocket Singh – Salesman of the year, Wake up Sid or Rockstar, but this movie alongside the upcoming Vishal Bhardwaj’s Matru ki Bijli ka Mandola seems like a step in a right direction as far as variation in his characters/roles/movies go. Though he earlier tried to be different in Luck & Kidnap, an experiment which backfired due to reasons best left unsaid.

Kareena Kapoor plays the character in her usually bubbly self…which she’s best in. Her role is another version of Geet of Jab we met.

Baoman Irani and especially Ratna Pathak Shah, in her Sarabhai mould, add punch to the proceedings.

Credit should also go the debutant director – Shakun Batra – for his refreshing style of narration and for being adventurous enough to end a feel good movie in an unconventional way.

Music by Amit trivedi and lyrics by Amitabh Bhattacharya go perfectly well with the moods and flow of the movie.

And one thing, movie is certainly not a remake of - What happens in Vegas

Overall, it’s worth a dekko.

Friday Releases – 10^th Feb’12

Continuing with my series where I express my opinion / expectation on the Friday releases as a movie goer.

Let’s take a quick look at last week’s release – Gali Gali Chor hain.

I was bang on with my prediction.

No I didn’t watch the movie, trailer didn’t excite me.

As per general word of mouth & various reviews movie was neither a satire nor a mad cap comedy but a mish mash. As I’d predicted that Akshay Khanna is a competent actor and here too he got the brownie points; but he’s not in a category of Khans, Kumars, Kapoors or Roshans to get the movie an opening on his own, so couldn’t do much for the movie. Movie adds up to the list of bombs of 2012.

The “Channo” item number was another reason for not going for the movie (doesn’t mean that I go for a movie for its item number ;-)) it looked cringing. One just can’t add an item number with any lady available to shed clothes….an item number needs a certain level of sensuality and class. Nothing against Veena Malik but this one was in your face and too forceful, with all the blatant expressions of her.

Now, coming to the current week’s release – Ek main or Ekk tu.

Trailers look lively and colorful, though on the face of it there appears a similarity to “What happened in Vegas”.

Overall it appears like a perfect date flick for the Valentine season….a feel good rom-com, a genre Imran Khan rarely fails at.

Yes, I’m going to watch this one.

Trailers of the week:

Housefull 2 – Recently saw the trailer of Housefull-2, it looks crazy. 4 Father, 4 daughter, 4 prospective grooms…catch…..all prospective grooms are named Jolly…everybody in one single house.

One of the dialogues of Ritesh Deshmukh in the trailer is modeled on the lines of a dialogue spoken by him in the original.

Though, I didn’t like first part of the series this one looks bigger and a crazy mad-cap. Movie looks promising and better than the first one. Let’s wait for the future trailers to come out.

Paan Singh Tomar – Appears like a hard hitting performance oriented Irrfan Khan film…..should be an interesting movie considering the track record of Tigmanhu Dhulia.

Reminds of Bandit Queen probably because of the setting of the movie in Chambal.

 Gagan

Disclaimer - Please refer to the earlier post under the heading of Introduction and Disclaimer.

Current week’s release – Gali Gali Chor Hain.

I usually go for a movie on either the basis of its director, actor & promo or combination thereof.

On the face of it movie looks like a satire on system, going well with the tropical theme of corruption and the crusade against it. But satire depends mainly on the capability of director. Rumi Jaffery (Director) has been a writer of many successful comedy movies but had average outing as a director so far with God Tussi Great ho & Life Partner.

Akshay Khanna is a good performer & is coming after almost an year’s hiatus; but he has not had a solo success in long time.

Promos don’t come across as something to excite you to watch the movie.

Overall, movie will have to depend on its content to do the talking and a strong word of mouth to work at box office.

 Gagan

Disclaimer - Please refer to the earlier post under the heading of Introduction and Disclaimer.

*Source – Boxofficeindia.com.

Friday Releases – 3^rd Feb’12

I’m beginning with a series where I’ll express my opinion / expectation on the Friday releases as a movie goer.

Let’s take a quick look at last week’s release – Agneepath.

Last week’s release has emerged a big grosser & first certified hit of the year. It has collected approx. 81 Cr. net domestically in seven days* and is on its way to become the next member of 100 Cr. club over the second weekend; though it needs to be seen how far it goes further.

Positives working in favor of new Agneepath are many the biggest amongst them was undoubtedly the brand name – Agneepath – by any other name this movie at its current running time and the dragging later part may not have been this big a success.

Other positive is the performance by the stellar star cast of Mr.Rishi Kapoor, Mr. Sanjay Dutt, Hritik Roshan, Priyanka Chopra, Om Puri, Zarina Wahab and rest of the supporting cast.

The menace of Rauf lala (played by Mr. Rishi Kapoor) makes the screen crackle; for me the dark shade of the character is best highlighted at the moment when the tables have turned and Vijay Chavan gets better of Rauf lala, the later still doesn’t hesitate in passing a comment on the former’s sister – agar bete ka maatam nahi hota to bistar pe dal deta isko – hats off to Mr. Rishi Kapoor for playing the role with such aplomb.

The character of Kancha Cheena (played by Mr.Dutt) got a major support by the appearance, get-up, setting & background score; and turned out to be our own version of Voldemort.

It’s an established fact that Hritik Roshan is a good actor, here again he conveys the pain and anguish of Vijay Chavan well through his eye and portrays the character in his own way. Hritik underplayed the character as per the requirement of the role, but in the process gets overshadowed by the towering characters of Rauf Lala & Kancha Cheena.

Chikni Chameli, Katrina, acts as the icing on the cake.

At the same time movie has its own share of flaws - in fact, one of the major flaw is the same as was with the original – the songs.

Director & writers cleverly stayed away from the cult sequences of the original or used them with a twist of their own; but wherever original sequences are used the comparison becomes inevitable where Hritik doesn’t exactly match up to the national award winning performance of Mr.Amitabh Bacchan. I missed the silent aggression and raw anger of Mr.Bacchan. That’s the drawback of making remakes no matter how well you do you can’t escape comparison.

The den of Kancha Cheena and his mannerism, at certain place, remind of the den and the character of Khooka (played by Mr.Mohan Agashe) from Trimurti, another movie of Late Mr. Mukul S.Anand, director of the original.

The song and the romantic track post the death of Rauf lala acts as a speed breaker to the whole proceedings and take movie’s graph lower. In the process climax seems hurried and fails to take the proceedings to the crescendo.

Surprisingly as a major player in Mumbai’s underworld Vijay Chavan appears like a sole-operator most of the times.

Dialogues of original written by Mr.Kadar Khan are sorely missed.

Director Karan Malhotra has done a commendable job of picking up a cult classic and interpreting it in a fresh manner, making it worth a watch. I’d wait for his next outing; hoping it would again be high on drama & entertainment.

Trivia - Though as is being generally speculated that it’s Mr. Kapoor first negative character….he played another interesting negative character in Ramsay brother’s movie Khoj.

by Gagan

Introduction and Disclaimer

First of all I would like to thanks Venkatesh (a.k.a. Venky; and not Victory Venkatesh ;-)) to give me a platform to indulge in my passion for Cinema.

He is a guy who understands and appreciate cinema and we both share the same passion for Cinema, which leads to long discussions every time we watch a movie (which is almost daily or on alternate days) or while preparing our movie timetable for the approaching weekend.

Venky has been brought up on the staple diet of Telgu movies; as is evident from the build up he has given me…..thanks once again Venky.

Now let me give you an introduction about myself – I’m not a Cinema scholar, writer or critic; I’m finance professional by qualification. I’m one from the audience who has been fascinated by the magic created by the interplay of sound and light in a dark auditorium and have been watching movies as long as I can remember.

I’m trying to make a humble beginning to vent out my love for cinema and entertainment, irrespective of language, through this blog. Yes, I watch movies in Hindi, English, Punjabi (the languages I converse in), Telgu, Tamil, Japnese, Korean, Chinese (rest of all through the help of English subtitles most of the times or the dubbed version).

The basis for the title of our blog also stems from our craziness. Venky registered Blowingwoods as the title for our blog because we will be blowing on Woods – Holly, Bolly, Tolly, Kolly and rest of the movie woods.

The opinions expressed are our personal in the capacity of audience for whom movies are made; as is usually proclaimed by the film fraternity, completely sidelining the moolah involved. We are expressing the opinion because we are entitled to; we buy the ticket and watch the movies irrespective of entertainment quotient and quality.

The idea is not to get personal or demeaning or run down any person / movie in particular.

As we don’t have a network to gather the numbers we would be relying on external sources to quote the numbers, wherever we do so we will make an effort to mention the source.

Let the magic begin….!!

 Gagan

 Pawan Puri combo expected in 2012. The break up of this combo caused industry to deliver  Ravi Teja. Will patch up deliver more substantial results than Badri.....