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Madras Cafe (2013)
100 for attempt. 50 for execution
From time to time there comes a product that you have to sit up and take notice just because somebody even attempted it. Madras Café, with all its flaws, is one such movie. Ours has been a nation obsessed with Gods and saviors. Even more than the Jews, we Indians have always been looking for a savior to rescue us from the mire that is our lives. Our mythological stories are full of Gods to took human form to save mankind and our recent history is filled with people who are considered demi- Gods by their supporters. From Gandhi to Mamata, our leaders always evoke one of two reactions - total and unquestioned loyalty or complete and utter dismissal.
In such an environment, Madras Café tries to tell the story of, arguably, the most important political event of our times. The assassination of Rajiv Gandhi, without a doubt, changed the face of Indian politics. Shoojit Sarkar and John Abraham, producer, have to be commended for trying to tell an unbiased story on how Rajiv Gandhi came to be assassinated in a most gruesome manner.
The movie traces the story from the point of view of Bikram Singh, a RAW agent, who works undercover in Sri Lanka to undermine LTTE chief Prabhakaran and help get the peace process on track. Along the way, he is double crossed, kidnapped, lied to and loses the most cherished parts of his life. Unfortunately, John Abraham the actor does not live up to John Abraham the producer. John's limited acting abilities mean that we are left feeling cold and unattached to the main protagonist. This is not the first time John has essayed a promising role in the most lifeless manner possible (check out No Smoking or Shootout at Wadala).
The movie is filled with bad actors essaying promising roles or good actors essaying one-dimensional roles. For all the effort, Shoojit Sarkar fails to recreate the magic of Vicky Donor. He is let down by the script and the acting skills at his disposal.
But it is not all gloomy. Instead there is a lot to recommend about the movie. For one, the photography is top-class. Shot mostly in Kerala and Tamil Nadu, Kamaljeet Negi does a fine job of capturing the beauty and horror that must have been Sri Lanka in the Prabhakaran era. The music by Shantanu Moitra is complementary without being intrusive to the storytelling.
Then there is the fact that this movie was actually made. This is a moment when you have to put aside your demand for the perfect movie and watch Madras Café just so you can tell Bollywood that you'd prefer this brand of cinema to the Khans' brand. What John Abraham needs is to build a team of good technicians and actors. If he can continue to support and make money from the kind of cinema he believes in, it would be a turning point for Bollywood.
Verdict: Must watch
Maryan (2013)
What was Dhanush thinking?
Maryan turned out to be a total dud. The entire theatre kept groaning and moaning audibly through the movie.
The movie tells of a small town boy who decides to go to Sudan on a lucrative contract to help his future father-in-law escape a debt. In typical style, the first half of the movie introduces us to the protagonist and peripheral characters. It is light and filled with fun. The second half takes us to Sudan where the hero falls in the clutches of a band of kidnappers.
While the story looks compelling on paper, BharatBala should have left it alone. There is just too much advertisement like styling that it takes away rather than adds to the telling of what should essentially be a gritty story. That Bharat Bala doesn't have a clue about story telling is seen in the second half where only token scenes show us how someone might have survived in the hot desert. Instead, we are treated to scene after scene of Dhanush stumbling through the desert while thinking of his love back home. Groan!
Give it a miss. Go watch Ranjanhaa once more. Or maybe Aadukalam.
Immanuel (2013)
A throwback to older (?better) days
In Immanuel, Lal Jose ties to take on the subject of insurance fraud and the frustration a common man can feel when faces with a faceless corporation.
While the movie isn't something to rave about, the story-telling is a throw back to the 80s when Mamooty and Mohanlal brought the common man and his trials to the big screen. Mammooty is in his elements, putting in a fine performance as a man caught up in a situation he doesn't really understand. Fahad Faazil is himself. I think we have reached a point where we know that to expect from him. It will be interesting to see how his career pushes on from here. At times you are left wondering why he took up the role where he doesn't really have much to do. Then there is a scene in the end where he walks up to Mamooty and says, "You are my hero." I suspect that scene alone pushed him to take up the role.
A mention must be made of Reenu Mathews who plays Mamooty's wife perfectly. In fact, she was the only surprise package in the movie.
On the flip side, the movie is full of clichéd characters. The driven boss, the scheming colleague, the heartless head choppers, the friendly peon. At no point does any of the characters surprise you. And every twist is predictable.
Lal Jose will never list this among his better works. We have come to expect more from him.
This move falls in the "can watch" category.
Talaash (2012)
After the mindless films that preceded it during the Diwali weekend, Talaash comes as a breath of fresh air
The movie opens with a random accident involving a popular film star that seems to defy all explanation. It also introduces the main protagonist, Inspector Shekhawat (played gloriously by Aamir Khan). The rest of the movie details how the good inspector peels away the mystery surrounding the accident. Along the way, he also battles his own demons in the form guilt for his child's untimely death in an accident.
The movie is scripted well enough to keep you interested all the way to the end, even if the end if a tad bit tame.
Five-star performances from all the leading characters ensures that you are sucked into the mood and world that Reema Kagti creates. Nawazuddin Siddiqi gives another stellar performance to follow-up on his performance in Gangs of Wasseypur. Rani Mukherjee redeems her acting credentials after the disaster of Aiyaa. Kareena Kapoor is competent. However, it is Aamir Khan who steals the show with a highly nuanced performance which I am sure he will rate among his finest.
The music from Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy is very complimentary and at no time does it intrude, as it is want to do in Hindi films, into the story-telling. Instead it is very much part of the story-telling and at times even takes things forward.
The movie is another feather in the cap of Zoya Akhtar who has penned the story and screenplay along with the director Reema Kagti. The credits for the dialogs are shared between Farhan Akhtar and Anurag Kashyap.
After the mindless films that preceded it during the Diwali weekend, Talaash comes as a breath of fresh air and bears a promise that Bollywood is not all about assuming that the audience is a collection of sheep waiting to be sheared.
Spirit (2012)
This may not rank very high on Renjith's list of achievement, but kudos to him for making it nonetheless.
Spirit is a socially aware movie which takes on the subject of alcoholism. Mohanlal plays a reformed alcoholic TV presenter who decides to make a program on alcoholism. It is a simple movie filled with complicated characters and even more complicated interactions. The main protagonist, Raghunandan, is a writer-cum-TV show host whose alcoholism cost him his marriage. But he has managed to remain friends with his ex-wife and her new husband. The relationship between them is handled tastefully and with kid gloves. A scene where the new husband casually puts his arm around her is a master class in acting from Mohanlal. Very few actors could have pulled that scene off. Then there is the seemingly straight and mature neighbor, Capt Nambiar, played admirably by Madhu. The captain is the epitome of a responsible citizen and family man until his wife goes out of station, when he drops this pretenses and cheats on her. The comparison between the characters is not explored but lies there just below the surface – one an openly admitted alcoholic and the other a closet cheat; one secretly reviled and the other openly admired.
Then there is the poor plumber who is also an alcoholic and as far removed from the Raghunandan character that you can get but the similarities in both of them are striking.
Also contrasted are the two women, played by Kanika and Kalpana. One is educated and aware, so she walks away from a marriage she is unhappy in. The other is illiterate and unaware and stays in a marriage where her life is threatened almost every day.
The movie is a coming together of such personas and their interactions keep the story moving forward.
This may not rank very high on Renjith's list of achievement, but kudos to him for making it nonetheless.
My rating – 3/5 for content and sheer acting displays.
The Dark Knight Rises (2012)
A disappoint final chapter to an engrossing trilogy
A disclaimer right at the beginning here, I loved the trilogy.
Okay, so Gotham has been having it good for 8 years and we join the story on Harvey Dent Day. We learn that Batman has taken the fall for Dent's death and disappeared, and Bruce Wayne has become a recluse. But a storm is coming.
The third installment of the Dark Knight trilogy is a very unworthy final chapter to what has been till now a fascinating journey. The disappointments start with the villain in this installment – Bane, played by Thomas Hardy (of Inception fame). After Neeson's Ra's Al Ghul and Ledger's Joker, Hardy's Bane seems tame and comic.
Let's face it, it is tough to make a good superhero movie nowadays. Technology has moved so far ahead that almost everybody is a Spielberg or Lucas now. It is difficult to think up plot lines and action sequences that that fresh and novel. The movie suffers from this. Apart from Hardy, almost everybody else in the movie disappoints. Michael Caine, Gary Oldman, Joseph Gordon-Levitt (Inception), Marion Cotillard (Inception), Anne Hathaway, are all ordinary. Christian Bale, however, delivers a standout performance as the life- weary Bruce Wayne. Unlike the previous two installments, here he mesmerizes.
All this said, I have seen the movie twice and will see it twice more before it reaches the 30-day mark. So all in all it cant be all that bad. It does keep you engrossed in fits and starts. But as a trilogy, a benchmark has been set.
Antardwand (2008)
A must watch
Anthardwand tells the story of a young man who is abducted as the groom to a rich man's daughter. While this may seem like it turns everything about the marriage system in India on its head, what really transpires is just the opposite.
Set in Bihar, the movie traces a side of India's flawed marriage system that is usually not looked at. It raises questions that are uncomfortable and with no easy answers.
The direction is top class with no wasted scenes. Every scene in the movie is carefully weighed and placed like a chess piece on a board. The acting is capable, but the story is so good that you don't need amazing acting to bring the story to life.
A must watch.
Ee Adutha Kaalath (2012)
Interesting yarn. A tab bit too long
Murali Gopy spins a fantastic yarn about a set of people who are all heading to converge on a series of events. The actors in this play come from differing backgrounds but end up having to depend on each other to make sure they are able to salvage their lives.
There are a few places where the director slipped up which took away a lot from the viewing pleasure. First is the opening background narration by Jagathy Sreekumar which leads you to believe that he is a key played in the events to come and that the story is somehow about Trivandrum, the city. Neither is true and that leaves you disappointed in the end. Then there is the slide at the opening, which he claims that the Rubik's cube has some gazillion moves and that when it all fits together it is beautiful. The statement in itself is good, but then it gives away the end and takes away the suspense. It would rather have been more apt to have that sentence mouthed by someone in the movie, just before the end when the pieces are all finally falling into place.
But the criticism notwithstanding, the movie is a good watch and very refreshing.
Dum Maaro Dum (2011)
A long yawn
There are good movies, there are bad movies and then there are movies that have all the right ingredients and fail to deliver - Dumb Maro Dumb is the third kind.
A crooked cop with all the reasons to go straight. A politician with the will to fight the drug mafia. Three innocent by-standers who were each burnt by the trade and yearn for revenge. A good villain, one you can hate. finally, not the least - Goa.
There ends anything and everything good about this movie. Instead of making a hard, gritty, dirty film Rohan Sippy and this group of writers come up with a tale that doesn't know whether it is going or coming.
Why on Earth would a hard cop rap in the middle of a movie? Abhishek is wasted in a role that fits him to a t.
Pancholi is everything you can expect from him in a role like this. But once again, he isn't given the license to become menacing enough.
The characters of the supporting cops are not allowed to develop enough to allow us to empathize with them.
I missed the last 15 minutes of an Agam concert for this crap, my loss.
Oh! and the Dumb Maro Dumb number is infinitely better in previews than in the movie.
Paa (2009)
a total letdown
If we were handing out awards for attempts, Balki and Paa would sweep the ceremony.
Paa has all the ingredients of a great movie. Not the least the greatest commercial actor of all time playing a challenged child. Amitabh is supported by a cast that was cast impeccably. Paresh Rawal as a retired, 'i understand the system' politician' Abhishek as a next gen politician with a very 'today' view of what politics should be, Vidhya as a strong single mother bringing up a challenged child.
But the movie fails. It is let down a sorry script, and poor direction. Then there is the eternal mistake films with kid characters make - making children mouth dialogs they would never in life.
Different is good, but it is not everything. Films are still all about story before anything else.
Good try Balki, but not there yet.
Swapnakoodu (2003)
Average fare
A youth story that focuses on style rather than substance. The story lets the star cast down. What starts out as a promising movie ends up making you wonder why you even hope?
When Kamala falls for Achayan, you are left wondering why? After all the pain taken to build her character as a girl with common sense and street sense, her falling for Achayan is way out of character and leaves the viewer feeling cheated.
Prithviraj is capable and goes through the motions without effort.
Bhavana is a breath of fresh air. I haven't seen any of her other movies, but she definitely has a presence that is pleasing and engaging.
Meera Jasmine, Jayasurya and Haneefa are the only saving graces in a movie that could have been much, much, much better.
The movie tries to be everything to everybody and ends up not pleasing anybody. It could have been the 'Dil Chahtha Hai' of the Malayalam industry, but it fails to deliver.