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Sharmeelee
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bethwatkins
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Beth Loves Bollywood
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"Note: I tried really hard to write this without referring to too many plot points, but I just couldn't make it work, so if you don't want to know what happens in the movie, don't read any further. But you won't leave empty-handed. Enjoy this!I really don't know what to make of this movie, but I also don't know if that matters, because most of it is really fun to watch. Visually it's lovely, with pretty locales, pretty people (Shashi Kapoor and Rakhee x 2), and an endless rainbow parade of fashion (I took over 100 screen captures, so if you want more, just let me know). I'm a big fan of both lead actors, and both deserve praise for handling with ease the varying compoents of their characters. Despite how much there was going on in the movie, with plot twists every fifteen minutes or so, I never felt that the characters themselves lurched. Shashi plays the good-natured but not-too-perfect Ajit with oodles of charm and truthful emotion; Rakhee gives different faces to each twin's plea ... " [More]
surprisingly lackluster: Commando
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bethwatkins
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Beth Loves Bollywood
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"In a recent discussion about 70s Bollywood, mere dost over at Teleport City mentioned that he was looking to combine two great tastes that taste great together: Bollywood and ninjas. I've believe I've mentioned my tendencies towards the researchy, and this is the kind of query that keeps me up past my bedtime. Fortunately, it took me less than 30 seconds to find Commando and send the recommendation on its merry way. And though ninjas are not something I ever seek out, I figured that they were likely to correspond to things I do enjoy, such as spies, villain lairs, or crass, fake-pretend Japanese elements; when a little more research revealed that the star was Mithun "I am a disco dancer" Chakraborty, I gladly hopped on board.Bad idea.Commando could have been so much more. Somehow the people in charge of this project managed to squander the following rich resources and wound up with a mediocre, half-arsed, unengaging snooze:Mithun as a nation-saving soldier who has a love interest ... " [More]
Sharmeelee
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bethwatkins
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Beth Loves Bollywood
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"Note: I tried really hard to write this without referring to too many plot points, but I just couldn't make it work, so if you don't want to know what happens in the movie, don't read any further. But you won't leave empty-handed. Enjoy this!I really don't know what to make of this movie, but I also don't know if that matters, because most of it is really fun to watch. Visually it's lovely, with pretty locales, pretty people (Shashi Kapoor and Rakhee x 2), and an endless rainbow parade of fashion (I took over 100 screen captures, so if you want more, just let me know). I'm a big fan of both lead actors, and both deserve praise for handling with ease the varying compoents of their characters. Despite how much there was going on in the movie, with plot twists every fifteen minutes or so, I never felt that the characters themselves lurched. Shashi plays the good-natured but not-too-perfect Ajit with oodles of charm and truthful emotion; Rakhee gives different faces to each twin's plea ... " [More]
a little gutsy: Doosra Aadmi
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bethwatkins
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Beth Loves Bollywood
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"I think this movie was about forgiveness (of both self and others), but I'm not sure. The more compelling question, which I have been thinking about all day, is what it meant to say by including small, simple scenes of things you don't see very often in popular Hindi films - not making a big production out of being shocking but just showing adults, both younger and older, making decisions without thinking them through as far as they should have. Some characters demonstrate a lot more id than responsibility and others are self-sacrificing, and generally these behaviors coincide with values that are basically categorized as modern or traditional.* Yet I don't think the movie is saying "non-traditional is bad, look what happens to people when women don't get married and have jobs alongside men, look what happens when a couple gets married without parental approval." There's something about the everyday-ness (at least, "everyday" by my own personal standards) of some of these scenes th ... " [More]
when doves cry: Maine Pyar Kiya
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Beth Loves Bollywood
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"(Surely that's been used before?)No one is more surprised than I am that I enjoyed this movie. I really dislike Hum Aapke Hain Koun...! and Hum Saath-Saath Hain,* but I have an inexplicable affection for Main Prem Ki Dewaani Hoon. So I went in with low hopes - after all, what if I only like MPKDH because it's refreshingly Salman-free? But whaddya know, I really did like Maine Pyar Kiya, even though it 1) dragged towards the end, with too many obstacles being thrown in the hero's way, 2) had way too many songs, most of them sung by S. P. Balasubramaniam, whose voice was a distractingly poor fit for Salman's character (or his own speaking voice, for that matter), 3) overly balletic dancing here and there, and 4) occasionally overdone drama and foes that weren't adequately fleshed out. There were also a lot of elements here that I had seen before - the feuding fathers reconcile as they see their young-lovers offspring survive grave physical danger (Bobby), a pack of goons beating u ... " [More]
collaborative-ish project #2: c ...
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bethwatkins
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Beth Loves Bollywood
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"Movies and music go well together, I think we can all agree, being Bollywood fans and all. So with that in mind, I'm delighted to present a collaborative post by Bollywood Desi Music Club and yours truly on the musical and filmi greatness that is Shaan.A bit of background - redundant if you've seen the movie, of course, but I hope incredibly tempting if you haven't, because you really ought to.... Sunil Dutt, Amitabh Bachchan, and Shashi Kapoor play brothers; the former is an up- and outstanding police officer who moves to Mumbai, where the other two are small-time con artists - so small-time that they seem to be the victims of jobs as often as they pull them off. Kulbhushan Kharbanda is a Blofeld-esque bad guy who controls various evildoings from his underwater lair, which, according to the subtitles, is 300 km off the coast of Mumbai and is clearly deep in the ocean based on the sea creatures that constantly swim by the background of the evil meeting room. Almost everything about ... " [More]
Shaadi Se Pehle
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Beth Loves Bollywood
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"You know what the worst thing about Shaadi Se Pehle is? The sound effects - they're cartoony: slide whistles, crashing noises, overly loud footsteps, that sort of thing. Even Akshaye gets in on the act and resorts to talking like Scooby Doo a few times. It's ridiculous, and it adds to the wackadoo feeling of the movie, which in my book is veeeeery dangerous, because most versions of wackadoo leave me completely cold. (Hungama is my Bollywood wackadoo yardstick, even if no one ever agrees.)Other than that admittedly minor complaint, this really wasn't so bad. Although as Totally Basmatic wisely reminded me in the context of Chori Chori, that's the kind of compliment that's the kiss of death. Here it's not quite death - if you stumble across Shaadi Se Pehle you'll quite possibly enjoy it just fine, timepass, perfeclty pleasant few hours, but don't go out of your way.Which brings me to the real question at hand: why is someone with the talents of Akshaye Khanna making movies I should ... " [More]
Bandit Queen
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bethwatkins
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Beth Loves Bollywood
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"History, culture, life, human nature - whatever you want to call the forces that cause us to act the way we do - can be brutal, selfish, narrow, dumb, bleak. Sometimes all of these elements and adjectives come crashing down in a single narrative, and when they do, we get Bandit Queen's story of Phoolan Devi.* Is there resolution? No. Forgiveness? No. Peace? No. Regret? Not that I understood. Responsibility? Only when forced. Sympathy? Very little. Courage? Maybe, but usually it gets filtered through fear and revenge. Community? Maybe, but societies in the world of this movie just seem to drive individuals to either mob behavior or extreme complacency.This last point is what disturbed me most. How many people saw the literally countless abuses against Phoolan Devi and did nothing? Dozens, hundreds. By no means does this justify most of her decisions and actions, but it very quickly and thoroughly creates an environment in which I could accept why she did what she did.The movie's lit ... " [More]
21st-century girl: Bobby
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bethwatkins
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Beth Loves Bollywood
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"Like Seeta aur Geeta, Bobby was something I read about but thought I'd never get to see, as neither my local video store nor the Indian grocery store had it. But during a quick stop at the latter on Saturday, while looking over other shoppers' heads at the Hindi shelves, scanning for Shaadi se Pehle, which is mysteriously always out, lo and behold! Another classic and my education continues. I consider both of these finds auspicious, and I can't wait to find out what other older gems he has for me.Anyhoo, you know a movie is going to be fantastic when you get to say "Woah, dancing on the ceiling!",it has a young Farida Jalal with a really creepy doll,the hero's house looks like...um...a magical mystery tour through several previous centuries of furnishings and architecture (why do Bollywood's rich families always have such gigantic main rooms, especially with grand staircases? Is this an ideal house form in India? I can see how it's good for parties, dance scenes, and weddings. Ma ... " [More]
what I learned from Munna Bhai ...
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bethwatkins
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Beth Loves Bollywood
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"To get them out of the way first, the two things that really bugged me in this movie:1) What the hell happened to his family for the sequel? I'm so confused.Was there an explanation for this 180 in Lage Raho Munna Bhai that I don't remember? Like a quick exchange at the beginning, with Circuit saying "Yaar, it's a real bummer your family was all killed in that fiery autorickshaw crash" and Munna says "Yeah dude, but I'm over it, now that I'm back in the mobster game." I'm almost willing to chalk this up to insuffient subtitling, but the subtitles in LRMB were superb.2) Double standard alert! Double standard alert! Heaven forbid a fine, ethical character like Munna Bhai even think about dating a woman who dances like thiswhen it is common knowledge that all women like that are good for is whoring out to shy, upstanding young men so they don't die without having a sexual encounter. I am so unbelievably sick of that crap. I almost turned off the movie here I was so worked up about the ... " [More]
surprisingly lackluster: Commando
By
bethwatkins
in
Beth Loves Bollywood
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"In a recent discussion about 70s Bollywood, mere dost over at Teleport City mentioned that he was looking to combine two great tastes that taste great together: Bollywood and ninjas. I've believe I've mentioned my tendencies towards the researchy, and this is the kind of query that keeps me up past my bedtime. Fortunately, it took me less than 30 seconds to find Commando and send the recommendation on its merry way. And though ninjas are not something I ever seek out, I figured that they were likely to correspond to things I do enjoy, such as spies, villain lairs, or crass, fake-pretend Japanese elements; when a little more research revealed that the star was Mithun "I am a disco dancer" Chakraborty, I gladly hopped on board.Bad idea.Commando could have been so much more. Somehow the people in charge of this project managed to squander the following rich resources and wound up with a mediocre, half-arsed, unengaging snooze:Mithun as a nation-saving soldier who has a love interest ... " [More]
I just know that when I get hom ...
By
bethwatkins
in
Beth Loves Bollywood
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"...and then I can, with great delight, reply "Why yes, indeed I did!" Yesterday afternoon at the Oberoi Grand Hotel in Kolkata, I met a movie star. Let me just say two things before I tell the story. 1) With the possible exception of my FPMBF, I don't have any desire to actually interact with any Bollywood stars (or any kind of celebrity, for that matter). What on earth would I say to them? 2) Other than former Canadian prime minister Pierre Trudeau, I have never had to answer that question, becuase I've never had any conversations with anyone who counts as a celebrity. Until yesterday.We're sitting in the Oberoi lobby, waiting to go to the train station for our overnight trip to Varanasi, when Rajan comes up to me and says "See that woman over there? She's ______. She's been in several fimls. And that man with her is ______, a director." I'm not putting in ______ to be secretive; I didn't recognize either name, so they went in one ear and out the other. I handed Rajan a pen and to ... " [More]