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Showing posts with the label novel

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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The Girl on the Train(2021): No spoiler review

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The Girl on the train (2021) directed by Ribhu Dasgupta Cast: Parineeti Chopra, Kirti Kulhari, Avinash Tiwary, Aditi Rao Hydari and Tota Roy Chowdhary.  So how does one ruin a best selling novel in its Indian cinematic adaptation? Hmm let me think, the direction is first rate, the screenplay-editing- technically everything is fine then how? Simple, just cast an incompetent artist in the titular role, goal accomplished. Story ruined, perfect case of imperfect casting. Can you imagine Neetu Singh as Umrao Jaan or Jaya Bhaduri in Satyam Shivam Sundaram or maybe Sonam Kapoor in Tumhari Sulu? Add Miss Chopra to that list.  The story is full of intrigue, for any mystery genre lover this is without a doubt a scrumptious buffet spread to binge on. A young woman battling alcoholism and amnesia along with recent miscarriage, divorce and an in active job finds solace in an voyeuristic obsession that turns complicated after an unexpected murder!  Now she has to not only prove her ow...
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ARANYER DIN RATRI(1970): Classic revisited

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Directed by: Satyajit Ray  Cast: Sharmila Tagore, Kaberi Bose, Simi Garewal, Soumitra Chatterjee, Rabi Ghosh,  Subhendu Chatterjee,  Shamit Bhanja, Pahadi Sanyal, Premashish Sen, Dibyendu Chatterjee, Samar Nag and Aparna Sen. If I’m asked to name just one movie directed by THE Ray as my personal favorite then the title keeps changing depending on my mood, it varies from Nayak(1965) to Ganashatru(1989), sometimes it’s Mahanagar(1963) and most of the times I name Charulata(1964), but such is Ray’s cinematic appeal that it’s difficult to select just one! Right now depending on my mood it’s his classic tale Aranyer Din Ratri(1970), a timeless classic that somehow never fades or gets old.  Four young men in the ir late 20s and 30s from Calcutta set out on a weekend Escapade out in the wilderness, they bribe the housekeeper at a Dak Bangla to get rooms and embark on exploring the woods and a virgin village. Here each of these men is different from the other, though bonde...
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THE WHITE TIGER (2021): review

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Directed by: Ramin Bahrani  Cast: Adarsh Gaurav, Priyanka Chopra, Rajkumar Rao,  Nalneesh Neel, Mahesh Manjrekar, Swaroop Sampath, Kamlesh Gill, Vijay Maurya, Master Vedant, Ram Diwakar and others  Incredible India ! That’s what you want to show to the world and what do you end up showing ? The filth, the grossly disgusted dirty slums, scavengers and slum dwellers? That’s the Indian bioscope that can earn you brownie points when displayed at international level, exactly what you see in this Netflix original film.  Balram is a jolly villager from the remotest village (dirtiest) in some corner of India, he’s ambitious and a viciously smooth operator. He makes his way into the household of a wealthy corrupt man and procures the job of his America returned son’s driver. Everything goes smoothly until a tragic incident that changes the entire discourse of his life!  If you’ve read the novella you’ll realise that some positive elements have been scrapped out in the mo...
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MIDNIGHT’s CHILDREN (2012)

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MIDNIGHT’s CHILDREN by Deepa Mehta Cast: Satya Bhabha, Siddhartha Suryanarayan, Shriya Saran, Ronit Roy, Shahana Goswami, Shabana Azmi, Seema Biswas, Anupam Kher, Kulbhushan Kharbanda, Soha Ali Khan, Rahul Bose, Neha Mahajan, Ranvir Shorey, Vinay Pathak, Rajat Kapoor and others.  Unsure if this movie had a theatrical release in my country( when internationally released in 2012-13) but it certainly makes Mira Nair’s A Suitable Boy(2020) look like a classic. Mehta has failed in every aspect of this cinematic adaptation of a great novel.  It is claimed that the writer Salman Rushdie was really proud of this adaptation, really? Why? It’s bizarre and disjointed, a complete cold blooded murder of cinematic liberty. Specially the second half that zooms like Rajdhani Express with no halts.  While the novel dealt with human emotions, the dilemma of a young adult in post independent India, his tribulations, self discovery etc. Here it goes to another level, more like a desperate a...
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