chanakya-dwivedi Reviews

Resident Evil: Retribution (2012)

It is not even close to what you will be expecting!!

[3/10 · 15 September 2012]

I was eagerly looking forward to the 5th installment of this series and I am sorry to say that I have been really let down! Apart from the once in a while visuals, the movie has not been able to get even close to expectations. The first 10 minutes of the movie and you will start feeling disconnected from the movie already not caring at all what is gonna happen in the next scene. After resident evil 3 & 4, I was expecting a lot out of this installment and from Paul W.S. Anderson but he has not been able to live up the mark at all. The action scenes rather than being nail-biting, turned out to be hilarious and funny. There isn't a single moment in the movie where you are actually glued to screen. Milla Jovovich looks pretty as always, but that won't save the movie. All others have done a horrible job with their acting, especially Sienna Guillory. I would say that the only reason you would want to watch this movie is if you are a fan of the resident evil series and you don't mind wasting your money and time for the sake of this series.

Band Baaja Baaraat (2010)

The director knew all the 'TARKEEBEIN' for making a hit!!

[8/10 · 9 February 2011]

After a long time you get to see a lovestory packaged in a completely fresh manner by Yashraj banner which has a very few dull moments. The debutant director Maneesh Sharma has done an excellent job in his first movie with a debutant actor Ranveer Singh and Anushka Sharma who is doing only her third movie. The movie though having no big names turns out to be a complete entertainer. The tone of the movie is set by the song 'tarkeebein' right in the beginning. You will realise that Ranveer Singh might not be that accomplished an actor, but still he has done a very good job playing Bitto Sharma, the carefree lad from Saharnpur studying in Delhi to break away from the clutches of his village agricultural business. On the other hand, Shruti Kakkar(Anushka) is a typical girl from Janakpuri, Delhi aspiring to be a big wedding planner. The hero heroine meet and starts the business of wedding planning. The movie thereon catches their journey from bottom to top with a lot of twist and turns. The director has tried to make sure that there is not a single dull moment in the movie and handles the storyline very well. The director has also captured the Delhi wedding scene in an excellent manner making this movie even more fun to watch. Ranveer Singh has got great comic timing and surprisingly he is the one who actually makes the movie worth the watch. Some people think that Ranveer is not hero material, but he has done complete justice to his role and you couldn't have expected better casting, though Manu Rishi was completely wasted as the inspector in the movie. Anushka, with all other actors has done a very good job. Though the movie becomes a bit predictable towards the end, but still overall it turns out to be a very good watch. Its a must see for people who love seeing fun movies!!

Gulaal (2009)

All the director had to offer were really really dumb men!!!

[1/10 · 22 November 2010]

OK, so many people think that this movie is a masterclass and the director has done a great job with it, but in reality the director has just made a fool of all the people who see it. There were many positives in the movie too, but the negatives were so strong that the positives stood negated. To start with, the actors taken for the movie were i would say almost perfect, but that could not help the really dumb storyline. I guess the movie should have come with a disclaimer that all people in the movie, barring two, are really dumb, someone would make a fool off them and they would be completely clueless about that. What the director was doing for the film was that first he would introduce a character to the audience, then he would make them like that character, and then suddenly a big fool would be made out of that character. This thing continued till the end of the movie, be it for the character of Rananjay Singh, Dilip Singh or for that matter Dukey Bana. Well I understand that the director wanted to make a movie where he wanted to show how a single woman can manipulate so many men, but seriously, where in the world will a brother ask his sister to go around sleeping with men. The only reason a person would want to see this movie is if he wants to get irritated. Piyush Mishra who otherwise is a great actor was a complete waste with a role where he was made to act lunatic. In the end i would want to say that the director made this movie just to irritate the audience, which was definitely not expected from a director of Anurag Kashyap's caliber. And also the song 'jaise dur desh ke tower mein ghus jaaye aeroplane' was really insensitive towards the American sentiments. It was actually making fun of an incident where more than two thousand people lost their lives.

Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam (1999)

Spare Yourself the Horror!!!

[2/10 · 20 November 2010]

Sanjay Leela Bhansali might offer you one of the best cinematography in the Indian cinema, but the same cannot be said about the quality of his movies. When he made this movie, I guess he wanted to add everything that he could to this movie, drama, comedy, emotion, romance, tragedy, sacrifice, etc, etc. The movie looked very similar to a saas-bahu serial with even bigger sets and even more expensive costumes. In some scenes the characters of the movie were having fun on the dinner table, somewhere they were singing, somewhere they were flying kites, etc, etc. Then the love story, then the issues because of the family(which I could not understand very clearly as Sameer seemed to be a decent fellow but still the girl's family had problems with him as if he was an alien). Then entered Ajay Devgan who it seemed acted in the movie as if he had to pay off some old debt of the director. He looked irritated, sad, angry, and cheated for most part of the film. It seemed as if the director had taken inspiration from saas-bahu serials and some fairy tales. After seeing the movie you would be left thinking that this was probably one of the most impractical movies that you would have seen in your entire life. Some scenes of the movie leave you irritated beyond any repair. I would like to mention one particular scene from the movie where Ajay Devgan and Salman Khan are sitting in the Church and Ajay Devgan is about to ask Salman khan his name but he is interrupted by someone. You should actually see the scene to understand what I am trying to say. In the end I would want to say that Mr. Bhansali made a movie for the audience who were tired of seeing serials at their home and wanted to come to the theatre to see the same thing at a grand scale with much bigger sets and a bigger starcast.

Golmaal 3 (2010)

What was Rohit Shetty thinking???

[2/10 · 20 November 2010]

Finally the much awaited Golmaal 3 released and not to my surprise it was really disappointing. Rohit Shetty might have given good comedies like Golmaal, and average comedies like Golmaal 2 and All The Best earlier, but this one was a complete let down. I should more simply put it this way that with every subsequent release, the quality of movies made by him are decreasing. There was nothing new to offer in this movie and all the jokes were old. As always, comedy in the movie was character based rather than situation based. What the director was offering was comedy which would make us laugh on characters that had something wrong with them like someone could not speak, someone stammered and someone forgot things(just like Aamir Khan from Ghajni) and there were no situations as such which made a person laugh. Even good actors like Ajay Devgan and Arshad Warsi could do nothing to save the really really weak script. As always in Rohit Shetty movies, there was a lot of noise, lot of commotion, an irritating Tushar Kapoor, some larger than life fight scenes, but no good humor this time round. Mithun Chakravarty for most part of the movie was just making painful funny faces that left one irritated. I am sure he would not want to do another movie which is even close to similar to this. The story of the movie was very predictable and I would not like to shed any light on that because that would be wasting your time. I should say that this movie did not even qualify for a brainless humor flick. For most part of the movie, everyone was fighting with each other as if they were 5th standard kids. In the end I would just want to say that by all means you should avoid this movie, and still if you are willing to see this movie, it would be on your own risk. And by the way this movie is not a sequel to the previous parts but more like an episode based on the same characters.

Do Dooni Chaar (2010)

A strong script and Rishi Kapoor make the firm worth it!

[7/10 · 27 October 2010]

I don't remember when was the last time i saw a movie with such a simple but strong storyline. I won't term this movie as a comedy but it definitely had humor in it. The plot of the movie is so simple that any middle class Indian would be able to relate to it, the dream of Duggal Family to become the owner of a four wheeler from a two wheeler(as you can already make out from the title). Rishi Kapoor essays the role of a low earning maths teacher which he played to perfection, hardworking and still hated by his students(reminded me of some of my school teachers), Neetu Kapoor was the housewife who in parts reminded me of my mother, hardworking and tired but still non complaining. Add to that two kids who always have complaints from there parents as they are trying to become a part of the high society friend circle. The house and the society in which the Duggal's stayed kept me guessing through out the movie as to which part of Delhi was it as it could have been any middle class Punjabi dominated area of Delhi. Add to this a lot of complicated situations to the life of the Duggal's in their effort of buying a car and you get a complete family package. It is a movie without the usual glam sham which you expect from a Hindi movie but considering the story and the excellent acting of Rishi Kapoor, I don't think there was a need for any. See this if you like simple family movies without any melodramas.