Tashan (2008)

A woman runs off with her gangster boss's money, and he hires her betrayed ex-lover and a bounty hunter to bring her back.

Director:

Vijay Krishna Acharya

Writers:

Vijay Krishna Acharya (story), Vijay Krishna Acharya (screenplay)

Stars:

Akshay Kumar, Saif Ali Khan, Kareena Kapoor

Cast

Credited cast:
Akshay Kumar	...	Bachchan Pandey (as The Akshay Kumar)
Saif Ali Khan	...	Jeetendra 'Jimmy Cliff' Kumar Makwana (as The Saif Ali Khan)
Kareena Kapoor	...	Pooja 'Guddiya' Singh (as The Kareena Kapoor)
Anil Kapoor	...	Lakhan 'Bhaiyaji' Singh (as The Anil Kapoor)
Rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Mukesh Bhatt
Rajesh Jais	...	Tiwary
Ehsan Khan
Ibrahim Ali Khan	...	Young Bachchan Pandey
Sanjay Mishra	...	Misir
Manoj Pahwa	...	Pinto
Arjun Sablok
Yashpal Sharma	...	ACP Kuldeep Singh Hooda
Tarun Shukla

Storyline

Jeetendra Kumar Makwana is employed full-time at a Call Center and works part-time teaching English. He is recruited by an attractive young woman, Pooja, to teach her Hinglish-speaking boss, Bhaiyaji, English. Jeetendra agrees to do so, falls in love with Pooja, and joins forces with her to steal a bag containing 25 Crore Rupees in cash. He will soon find out that Bhaiyaji is a hoodlum and extortionist known to the Police as Lakhan Singh.

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Plot Keywords:

police | love | call center | gangster | bounty hunter | 

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Taglines:

The Ishtyle... The Goodluck... The Pharmoola

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Genres:

Action | Comedy | Crime | Drama | Romance

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Details

Country:

India

Language:

Hindi

Release Date:

25 April 2008 (India)

Also Known As:

Style

Filming Locations:

Alleppey, Alappuzha District, Kerala, India

Box Office

Budget:

$8,247,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

£182,063 (UK) (25 April 2008)

Gross:

$428,923 (USA) (2 May 2008)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Yash Raj Films

Technical Specs

Runtime:

120 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Ajay Devgn was the original choice for Anil Kapoor's role.

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Goofs

In the opening scene the red car used by Bachchan and Jimmy has number UGR-9403. The cars number changes when it jumps off the cliff.

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Crazy Credits

All the cast names and department names appear with the initial 'The' in the beginning credit. An ode to Bhaiyaji's (Anil Kapoor) character speaking Hinglish in the movie.

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Connections

Featured in Ladies vs. Ricky Bahl (2011)

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Soundtracks

Bachchan Pande Ka Tashan
Written by Vijay Krishna Acharya
Composed by Vishal Dadlani and Shekhar Ravjiani
Performed by Akshay Kumar
Courtesy of Yash Raj Music

User Reviews

Great film

If there was any doubt after Dhoom 2 that Yash Raj films was in a steep downward spiral, that has now been removed. Tashan is as low as it can get. IMDb does not allow rating lower than 1 - otherwise I suspect this one would be in the negative column.

The story/plot - the threadbare plot boasts of a couple of twists that are laughable, and in fact it is all ishtyle (if you think tacky is the new ishtyle) and lacks any substance whatsoever. If there ever was supposed to be any connection between the events unfolding on screen (why eggzactly was Bhaiyyaji learning Einglis?), it was unclear and to tell you the truth I did not care! The dialogs were nightmarish - even Bhiayyaji's Hinglish became painful and incoherent as Anil Kapoor valiantly tried to stay in the mode.

The acting - oh well, who cares, it was all about ishtyle anyway. So let us just discuss that. Bhaiyyji (Anil Kapoor) had a certain ishtyle as the villain of old tradishun, Akki was the usual Ishtyle of the tasteless Tradishun (that was actually the only effective ishtyle in this film), Saif had the pathetic Ishtyle of a "cool dude" who sports a droopy mustache (now how many cool dudes can do that?), and Kareena had the size zero figure ishtyle - sadly the size zero removed all the b (as in booty) from her assets - minus boobs and butt she was almost androgynous. Oh, I should mention that none of these Ishtylish folks actually acted.

The music was ONLY thing that was worth mention in this film. Songs are catchy, and the picturization of Dil Dance Maare was interesting. For the rest - the story was unhappily chugging along when BOOM there was an unconnected song and dance routine.

The last 20 minutes took the film to a new nadir, unimaginable depths of dross. I HOPE AND PRAY THAT THIS FILM BOMBS. I have nothing against the studio or the cast (in fact I quite like Saif and Kareena), but if this film works then action movies will never be the same again and I will have to stop watching Hindi cinema that is action oriented. Seems a bit harsh but my mind is still reeling from the fact that hundreds of men with machine guns could not take out 3 people, these hundreds miraculously lost their guns, then there was hand to hand combat of the martial arts kind, there was a flame thrower, and it all culminated in a very big water hose and a jet ski doing a dry run! I thought Hritik's shooting out of the gutter act was bad and now I have been proved so completely wrong.

Trashun is one pathetic piece of trash that needs to be swept out and sent to a landfill immediately. I CANNOT BELIEVE I WROTE THAT!!!

I had the good fortune to view this one again on DVD - I humbly wish to revise my opinion.

We have a film that is truly unique in concept, shows small time people realistically, and even does a pretty good job of showing their ambitions and yearning to be "superior" - just like Jarj Bus! There is the excitement of a heist or sorts, chases galore, a pretend romance, and a real one that started during childhood (Devdas anyone?), a baddie villain, and cop who is sort of villainous, and lots and lots of action. Add to this the fact that we have one of the best roles ever done by a major superstar - yes Akshay Kumar. Kya entry Thi Aur Kya finish! We have a heroine who looks great and is full of guts and gumption - she will avenge the wrongs done to her family and she needs no one to help her do that, and she will put scruples aside just like a man! We have 3 lead men and the most amazingly different item song in Dil Dance Maare. What went wrong? My initial take on the film was that it was complete Bakwaas (watching films online does NOT help). But it was still strangely attractive to me and I broke down and got the DVD. Wah Bhai Wah. Music rocks, Akshay delivers his life's best acting, Kareena looks yummy (except in that size zero bikini), Saif is adequate. Anil Kapoor is one negative - he speaks Bhaiyya speak well early on, but gets totally incoherent as the film proceeds, and I think the audience was not ready for the spoof filled action sequences.

This is one film that deserves a look - for Akshay, for Kareena, for Dil Dance Maare, and Falak Tak (magical moments on screen) and for the streets of Kanpur and Akshay's entry. The best performance by any lead actor this year. You can fast forward Chaliya and Dil Haara but the rest is very very watchable. I hope the makers do not take the film's failure as a huge negative signal - Tashan was ahead of its time and will end up as a cult film of sorts.