Anuradha(1960)

Cast: Abhi Bhattacharya, Leela Naidu, Balraj Sahni Language: Hindi Running Time: 133 mins Director:Hrishikesh Mukherjee Music:Pt.Ravi Shankar Censor certificate:U Genre:Family,Drama My Review:First of all let me tell you the lead actress Leena

naidu is no madhubala,but there's something in her eyes & accent which makes her stunning.I never knew who Leena Naidu is before this movie.But after this movie I am wanting to watch more of her work.You can not expect anything less than a timeless classic from Hrishikesh Mukherjee & this one is precisely the one.The plot may seem boring,but considering the settings of 1960 this was surely a futuristic movie.The best part is that eventhough the movie is about sacrifices of a woman for her family,at no point you feel story to indulge in melodrama or sulking characters.Husband's character played by Balraj Sahni is so real.He loves his wife,child.He also is a dedicated doctor.The director at no point tried to portray a right or wrong character.As an audience you feel for Anuradha,but at no point you feel that the husband is responsible for it.I was impressed by few mature behaviours of the lead characters which was not expected out of 1960s characters.Infact even in so called modern cinema you see a melodrama when wife tell the husband that she wants to seperate after 10years of marriage.Top class performances & top class direction. Plot:Dr.Nirmal ,a young,dedicated,selfless doctor who sets up his practice in a small village(Nandgaon)to help patients who are unable to travel great distance to see medical professional.He meets with Anuradha Roy, a well-known Radio Singer and stage dancer, and falls in love with her, he treats her injured ankle, both fall in love, and get married, without the blessings of Anuradha's wealthy dad, Brijeshwar Prasad Roy. Both re-locate to Nandgaon where Anuradha gives up her singing and becomes a housewife. She soon gives birth to a daughter, Ranu. Then 10 years later, her apologetic dad comes to visit her, and takes Ranu away for a holiday with him. Shortly thereafter, Anuradha's former beau, Deepak, the England-returned man her dad had wanted her to marry, re-enters her life. He witnesses that she is being neglected by her overly busy husband, asks her to return back to singing, and go and live with her dad. At first she refuses and asks him to leave, then relents when she sees that Nirmal has indeed been neglecting her, even on their wedding anniversary. She then informs Deepak she is ready to move out. That night when Nirmal returns home, Anuradha informs him about her decision to leave him. Watch what impact this has on Nirmal, and what he does, if anything, in order to keep this marriage intact. My Ratings:4/5,A MUST WATCH IF YOU LOVE CLASSICS

Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara(2011)

Directed By:Zoya Akhtar

Produced By:Farhan Akhtar,Ritesh Sidwani

Music:Shankar,Ehsan,Loy

Running time:135min.

Language:Hinglish(Hindi,English)

Plot:3 friends Kabir(Abhay Deol),Imran(Farhaan Akhtar)&Arjun(Hritik) plan a bachelor road trip in Spain 2 months before Kabir’s wedding.The intention is to have fun & relive goodold college days.Imran has hidden agenda for choosing Spain which the other two are not aware of.Arjun has no time for such stupid trips.His only goal is to earn loads of money & retire at the age of 40.The only reason he decides to come is to make Kabir happy & he himself is going through an emotional breakdown due to break-up with his GF.Kabir is getting married to to his childhood buddy in two months.He is the most desperate of three for this trip.The reason is obvious for any guy who’s getting married soon.This road trip turns out to be the one where they overcome their fears literally & unknowingly emotionally.like Arjun overcomes his fear of water while attemting deep sea diving & Imran overcomes fear of height while jumping off the plane for sky diving.Kabir’s fear is the most interesting which he comes over in the climax during bull-run while almost getting stamped by a raging bull.

My Review:You can’t expect anything less from one of the most talented families of bollywood,”The Akhtars”.Zoya Akhtar’s direction is flawless.The conversations between 3friends are as natural as realtime friends sitting in a bar.No loud jokes or funny faces.Simple conversations between them also make you laugh just because as an audience you feel as if its you sitting with your friends in a bar.The topics are as natural as remembering an old school teacher with an accent,singing school anthems(My favourite is “Diamond biscuit “jingle by Hritik),bathroom pranks etc… The best part between three is the “My Buoy” jokes with an accent.The max fun is made at the cost of Arjun’s character as since beginning he has been a serious character.In real life also we make fun of the friend who’s poker faced.Imran is the most lively character & most lovable also in the film.In this regard I must say its sisterly love of the director to make this character most lovable plus the dialogues are written by Farhaan himself.So best of the lines are for his character.Its good to see a mature,non- stary act by Hritik.His lovestory with driving instructor(Katrina Kaif) is boring at times.Diving instructor ,that too Indian in Spain,going for drink with the boys after first session,sharing their bathrooms etc looked un-natural.Plus it didn’t add any value to the movie.Comparisons with Dil Chahta hain is inevitable.Even though DCH was more fun,this has its moments of fun in a mature sense.As if Sid,Akash & Sameer have grown up.Its like a sequel of DCH.The symbolic Bullrun in the climax puts Zoya Akhtar in the league of Anurag Kashyap & Vishal Bharadwaj.In all I really enjoyed the movie.

My Ratings:3.5/5,watch it.highly recommended.(I've a feeling that DVD watch might not be as much fun)

Shaitan(2011)

Director:Bijoy Nambiar

Producer:Anurag Kashyap

Music Director:Ranjit Barot,Prashant Pillai,Amar Mohite,Anupam Roy

My Review:Daughter of a diplomat Amy (Kalki Koechlin) shifts to Mumbai and makes friends with a bunch of urban brats who believe in living life on the edge. The gang includes KC (Gulshan Devaiya), a drug-peddler Dash (Shiv Pandit), model-cum-aspiring actress Tanya (Kirti Kulhari) and the idler Zubin (Neil Bhoopalam). A random hit-and-run episode on a dopey night lands them into trouble when a cop tracks them down and blackmails for huge ransom.

The gang mutually decides to fake Amy's kidnapping and ask for money from her father. Suspended Inspector Arvind (Rajeev Khandelwal) is asked to investigate the abduction case.

The rest of the movie is about how their imperfect plan starts failing at every stage till the filmi climax in Vasai church.

The first half an hour of the movie when Amy meets the rest of the gang is quite good with few innovative dialogues & scenes never seen before in Indian cinema mainly because of its bold content.Especially the first scene when KC meets Amy for the first time & asks her if she is interested in opening the joint account?refering to the joint in his hand.Terrace holi party has few good moments.The movie has been projected to be about today’s youth & everything in the first half really gives you the idea of today’s youth.The way they talk,party,loose language,No morality etc…but that’s it.The novelty ends there.Once their Hummer hits a scooter & kills two men,the movie becomes a typical commercial film with corrupt cop asking for ransom to hush up the case,they planning Amy’s kidnap to get 25lakhs from her father,angry young suspended cop getting the case off records,the gang finding a hideout in some lodge in Bhindi bazaar ,the news of kidnap reaching media& many more stories which we’ve seen hundreds of times in Indian cinema.

Over the years Anurag Kashyap has developed a reputation of a bold film maker.But in this case he chose the good subject but the bad director(Bejoy Nambiar).Actually bad is not the right word for him.Its just when u compare Anurag & Bijoy you find him bad.Bijoy as a director is good in parts.I congratulate him for few sequences in the movie which were top class.One of them was the shoot-out scene of Rajiv Khandelwal in slow motion with techno version of “Khoya Khoya Chand” playing in the background.Also the final chase scene Marathi song “Pintya gela” playing in the background.really good,I must say.But over all the whole movie does not do justice to the title Shaitan.There was hardly any shaitani in the second half.No double cross,No plans,Nothing.Just friends fighting with each other,arguing regarding the next step ,running around from one place to other etc..

For me there were two reasons to go for this movie.One was Anurag Kashyap & the other was soundtrack of the movie.The soundtrack is mindblowing.Songs like Nasha,Pintya gela,Farida are top notch.Ranjit Barot is a talented music director with few others.But unfortunately it has not been used well in the movie.

They have tried to show the short temper & impulsive behavior of today’s youth.But frankly I don’t think today’s youth is that dumb to plan self kidnapping or almost kill a friend in a bout of anger .I can understand the accident after a doping session.But killing a friend,asking for ransom from all the parents not only Amy’s but everybody’s,Not surrendering inspite of knowing that police is behind them & their kidnapping is on all the news channels.All these when they are not under the influence of alcohol or dope.We’ve seen the story of imperfect self kidnapping in Khiladi(Akshay Kumar)many years back.I expected something more sensible from Anurag.After this I feel like giving one more star to Anurag’s most ridiculous movie “NO SMOKING”.Atleast it was different.This one is not.My sincere advice to Anurag is to stop giving his name to any idiot like his previous boss Ram Gopal Verma.Otherwise he’ll spoil his own image.Still not much damage is done.This was not as bad as Ramu’s movies as producer.He better come up with a better movie under his direction.

My Ratings:2/5,Watch it on DVD