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Showing posts with the label comedy

JAWAAN (2023) : review

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And finally the much hyped, much awaited Jawaan saw light of the day ! Big stars, big budget( humongous budget actually), big music composer, everything super large. But does it meet the expectations of the average viewer? No it goes not. Read on.  A decorated jawan locks horns with a criminal called Kaali, this is in 1986 ( the year movies like Aakhri Raasta released, just for reference). Kaali gets him eliminated and send the pregnant wife to jail. The baby born in jail grows up to become the hero (look alike of the father) and decides to avenge the misdeeds done to his innocent patriotic parents. Well, isn’t it a masaaledaar full on Bollywood- Tollywood drama subject ?  And then the director Atlee also borrows ideas and references from various retro movies, some idea from Sholay (1975) as the hero assembled a gang of jailed Qaidis in order to form a team to nab the villain, then there’s an entire episode borrowed from Dhartiputra (1993), and the basic theme is copy pasted ...
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BHOOL BHULAIYAA 2- Review

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Priyadarshan’s sleeper hit bhool bhulaiyaa(2007) gets a poor cousin in the form of this franchise successor bhool bhulaiyaa 2 this time spearheaded by comedy king Anees Bazmee. Now Bazmee is nowhere in the league of Priyadarshan, considering his penchant for brainless comedies (some of which have become all time blockbusters) and the ‘brainlessness’ reflects in every frame of this horror- comedy!  Set very evidently in Rajasthan inorder to justify a ‘Royal’ background for the story, a lot of paranormal events start occurring in the Thakur family during the course of a wedding preparation week. Rooh Baba (Kartik Aaryan) arrives to solve the mystery which is deep rooted in the dark past of the Thakur’s.  Comedy- okayish, mystery- hollywoodish, music- pathetic. Overall is a bore drama, there are some genuinely funny moments specially the ones involving Mishra and Yadav, but Aaryan acting like a poor man’s Akshay Kumar is a big letdown. Advani looks as beautiful as 70s Dreamgirl b...
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REWIND TO DOORDARSHAN - part 1

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So the unavoidable lockdown makes you yawn in despair? And you have had an overdose of espionage spy thrillers and crime dramas on the ott platform ? Then revisit some good old feel- good slice of life television series from Doordarshan days which are available on YouTube and some other steaming platforms. What you’ll invariably and unmistakably find these retro serials is the simplicity of the characters that’s awfully missing today!  Kachchi Dhoop (1987)  Directed by actor Amol Palekar this desi ‘little women’ featured future one film wonder Bhagyashree in a pivotal role along with Ashutosh Govarikar and Palekar himself. Sweet, sugary and simple it’s the perfect remedy for a bored viewer! The characters are simple and relatable, they speak in a sing a song manner and make you fall in love with their on screen trials and tribulations.  Idhar Udhar (1985)  If you are an sitcom fan then this show is unmissable! Starring the talented Pathak sisters playing roomies alo...
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OK COMPUTER (2021): review

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Directed by: Pooja Shetty and Neil Pagedar  Streaming on : Disney hotstar  Cast: Vijay Verma, Radhika Apte, Kani Kusruti, Sarang Sathaye, Vibha Chhibber, Ratnabali Bhattacharya, Alok Ulfat, (Sp. App.)- Rasika Dugal, Jackie Shroff and Shekhar Kapur.  Are we ready for this? A sci fi black comedy set in a futuristic world predicting machines taking over human roles. If you don’t quite like this genre then skip it, otherwise it’s a nice watchable comic relief with recurrent hiccups.  Set in 2031 that is exactly ten years later, we are introduced to a modern world run by machines, humans totally dependent on technology which is superficially advanced. An unknown victim gets brutally murdered by an automated driven car and the acp (Varma) is assigned the task to nab the culprit. Considering a car has no feelings or emotions one has to find out who planned and executed the murder. Acp also has to find out identity of the victim. Several suspects pop up including a naked ol...
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PAGGLAIT(2021) review

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Directed by: Umesh Bist  Streaming on : Netflix  Cast: Sanya Malhotra, Ashutosh Rana, Aasif Khan, Rajesh Tailang, Raghuvir Yadav, Nakul R Sahadev, Jameel Khan, Sheeba Chadda, Meghana Mallik, Ananya Khare, Chetan Sharma, Shruti Sharma, Sharib Hashmi (Sp.App), Sayani Gupta(Sp.App) Surprise of surprises!! A Netflix original collaboration with Balaji Telefilms with no sex, no obscenity, no foul language !!! Are we dreaming ?  A simple uncomplicated story about an unexpected death of a young newly married man in an upper middle class household. The death shatters the family members and several relatives flock the house to be a part of the thirteen day funeral rituals/ rites. What surprises everyone is the young widow has no grief to express and is herself unable to accept the fact that she’s not sorrowful about the untimely demise of her husband of five months ! Leading to several situational comical proceedings the movie also highlights feminism in its brightest form.  ...
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A SIMPLE MURDER (2021) Review

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A SIMPLE MURDER (2020) directed by Sachin Pathak  Cast- Mohammed Z Ayub, Amit Sial, Sushant Singh, Priya Anand, Ayaaz Khan, Gopal Dutt, Vikram Kochhar, Yashpal Sharma and others.  Warning: In case you cannot comprehend black comedies you need to skip this, this is an out and out black or as they call it nowadays dark comedy. So the proceedings may be undigestible for certain viewers. Streaming on Sonyliv  The story is infused with comical coincidences including mice that create humorous errors leading to complicated yet entertaining repercussions. A young guy high on debt is erroneously assigned the deadly job of assassinating a politician’s daughter who has eloped with a Muslim boyfriend. He ends up killing the wrong girl, the victim’s partner is a retired contract killer who’s now on a mission to nab the killer, and wait there are some more interesting characters. The young man’s wife is cheating on him with her virile boss who in turn was having a scandalous affair wi...
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GULLAK (2021) Review

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GULLAK (2020-2021) directed by Amrit Raj Gupta  Cast- Jameel Khan, Geetanjali, Vaibhav Raj Gupta, Harsh Mayar, Sunita Rajawar and others.  This slice of life web-series has two seasons streaming on SonyLiv and is an TVF original presentation. Must watch.  Simple, relatable, down to earth, not describing a prospective bride or groom, these are the attributes for this slice of life web series titled Gullak, it could’ve been a real life story happening in your own home or the neighbourhood. Set in a middle class North Indian family of the Mishra’s it deals with their daily humorous as well as emotional situations (mostly arising out of comical goof ups) that’ll undeniably touch the emotional chord of viewers.  You could well be transported back to the memorable Doordarshan days when we had family comedies like Wagle Ki Duniya(1988) and Yeh Duniya Ghazab Ki(1990) and so many others bereft of television glamour and high on content. Gullak has that nostalgic feel to it. T...
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TRIBHANGA(2021): review

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Directed by: Renuka Shahane  Cast: Kajol, Tanvi Azmi, Kanwaljeet Singh, Mithila Palkar, Vaibhav Tatwawadi, Kunal Roy Kapur, Manav Gohil, and others  After watching TRIBHANGA there are two things I liked most about it, one the crisp length of just 1 hour 35 mins and secondly the supremely talented yet criminally underrated Tanvi Azmi.  Shahane’s directorial venture focuses on a dysfunctional family with three generations of women, when the oldest slips into coma the story moves into an emotional roller coaster journey wherein the characters reminisce the past, the bittersweet memories and bond over unbreakable womanhood.  Good concept? Certainly yes. And to give Shahane due credit she shows a spark in the director’s seat and one can expect far better and polished work from her in the near future, as for TRIBHANGA it’s a good opportunity lost. Shahane seems to have been an incessant hurry to wind up the project, the relationships between the characters don’t get deepe...
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COOLIE NO.1(2020): review

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Director: David Dhawan  Cast: Varun Dhawan, Sara Ali Khan, Paresh Rawal, Jaaved Jaffri, Johnny Lever, Anil Dhawan, Sahil Vaid, Bharti Achrekar, Shikha Talsania, Rajpal Yadav, Hemant Panday, Manoj Joshi, Vikas Verma.  Yet another remake! That’s going to be the standard expression no? David Dhawan remakes his own 90s hit, frame by frame, no room for improvisation, includes comic formulae that is so 90s that it’s outdated now, sigh! And as an audience you are expected to lap it up.  The story which has its basic plot exactly the same as the original goes like this, a Panditji (Javed Jaffri) is humiliated during a matchmaking  by an eccentric wealthy man(Paresh Rawal) who’s a Goan Christian. Now what a hindu pandit was doing at a Christian matchmaking ahem, it’s communal harmony you see. Anyways the pandit vows revenge and plans to get the wealthy man’s daughter married off to a roadside , err railway side coolie(Varun Dhawan). To complicate matters the coolie has to ro...
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DOLLY KITTY AUR WOH CHAMAKTE SITAARE (2020) review

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DOLLY KITTY AUR WOH CHAMAKTE SITAARE (2020)  Directed by: Alankrita Shrivastava  Cast: Konkona Sen-Sharma, Aamir Bashir, Bhumi Pednekar, Vikrant Massey, Amol Parashar, Kubbra Sait, Master Kalp, Master Hearty, Neelima Azim, Karan Kundra, Brij Bhushan Shukla, Saurabh Chauhan.  The director’s earlier movie Lipstick under my burqa(2018) though a terrible movie still had its moments, few but memorable. But this time there’s absolutely nothing worth remembering in this horrendously directed and conceptualised desi ‘Sex and the Noida city’. Dolly is a Noida based working woman who has to keep her husband, children and boss happy, her young cousin Kitty is a 30+ virgin(a fact mentioned multiple times) working at a phone sex call centre, both women are sexually frustrated, have complicated opinions and assumptions about their sexuality, basically it’s all about sex, sex and more sex, very crude and distasteful sex quite literally.  All Male characters are depicted as sex man...
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PARIWAR (2020) web-series review

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PARIWAR (2020)  Directed by- Sagar Ballary  Cast- Gajraj Rao, Vijay Raaz, Yashpal Sharma, Sadia Siddiqui, Ranvir Shorey, Abhishek Banerji, Nidhi Singh, Anurita Jha, Piyush Kumar, Kapil Tilhari, Kumar Varun, Neena Gupta (Sp.App.) Set in Allahabad/ Prayag Raj, an old man is hell bent on reuniting his wayward quarrelsome children and getting them under one roof. He tries every trick in the trade to stabilise his dysfunctional family leading to comical situations.  Ballary had a good authentically unique concept on hand, but it is ruined by too many predictable turns and quite a few over dramatic filmi sequences particularly in the last two episodes. Nevertheless it’s a decent attempt. Barring a few foul dialogues(mandatory on OTT isn’t it) it’s a decently clean family entertainer, no sex or violence not even a hint. Shot on location at Prayag Raj it has a beautiful cultural experience attached to it.  Rao delivers an impressive performance, so do Sharma and Shorey, it ...
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Hundred (2020) webseries

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HUNDRED (2020): Hotstar originals streams up a comic series which tries really hard to get a miniature smile on the viewer’s face.  So why is it titled hundred? Because a young girl working as a govt employee is suddenly diagnosed with a terminal illness and told very bluntly by a doc that she has only hundred days to live ! So it’s actually hundred days. The girl prepares a bucket list / wishlist and starts ticking the wishes she so wishes to fulfil before the doomsday. Interesting? Feels like it’s been dealt in many movies, tv series, etc etc true that.  There’s nothing entertaining in this series, most of the episodes are a total snooze fest. There’s an unrelated underworld track thrown in to create some ruckus but it only adds up to your yawns. And yes, there’s the mandatory Feminazi blah blah blahing which gets on the nerves. The makers were surely half asleep while directing.  Unable to understand why a female cop is expected to look and appear manly inorder to pro...
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Mastram (2020) webseries review

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Hmm so you can fantasise about this, just think about a chilling serene hill station, some erotic tales and lots of cleavage and skin show on display ! That’s exactly what’s in store in this webseries based on the fictional porn writer Mastram.  Set in the lovely luscious hill station Manali, a young story writer adapts the pseudonym Mastram and pens erotic tales which sell like hot cakes at the publishing house. He does that discreetly as he’s not too proud of his porn writing skills and his immediate family (a bachelor uncle) and the pretty girlfriend (Tara Alisha Berry- cute) are unaware of his skills. He prefers being known as a struggling boring story writer. Inorder to enhance his writing skills and add heaps of erotica to his story telling he starts studying subjects from around him including a neighborhood sex starved aunty, a curious Bollywood starlet, a horny female cop, a buxom village belle and many others, every woman is projected as an “sex object” here.  The sto...
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