Nautanki Saala

Cast: Ayushmann Khurrana, Kunaal Roy Kapur, Pooja Salvi, Evelyn Sharma, Gaelyn Mendonca

Director: Rohan Sippy

It seems that this movie was intended to depict much more depth than it has managed to convey. Rohan, the director is experimental and kudos to him for that. He has tried to present a ‘neither very generic nor very different’ storyline with a different concept i.e. by using the element of theatre aka ‘nautanki’. Genre of the movie is comedy and this comedy is different from others as it is not primarily dialogue based but situation and expression based. Also somewhere, the director has tried to use the theatre ‘nautanki’ as the metaphor for the mother of all ‘nautankis’ i.e. life itself! The movie constantly shifts between these two parallels. Backdrop of the former is modern day ‘Ramayana’ (most esteemed Hindu epic) and that of the latter is the protagonist trying to heal a suicidal ‘stranger turned dependent turned friend’ by finding his former love and giving him work so that he attaches some worth to himself. The essence of the story is basically situational misunderstanding. In spite of all his noble intentions and sacrifices, the protagonist is misunderstood by his partner, love and also friend! Reason for the same are age old human errors of - mixing task and emotion, undertaking an activity without giving a thought to its obvious result, trespassing territories etc.

Ayushmann, and Kunaal have acted well. Evelyn has some screen presence. The power of modern day theatre could have been presented in a more powerful and enhanced format. Also, the heroines could have been better. Some comedy scenes are really funny and some are original as well. Last but not the least, herein again you miss the element of complete showmanship. Are there no successors of Mr. Subhash Ghai and Late Mr. Yash Chopra?

Commando – A One Man Army

Cast: Vidyut Jamwal, Pooja Chopra, Jaideep Ahlawat

Director: Dilip Ghosh

In general, how do you define ‘good’ Bollywood action? Over the top, comical, prefixed and/or suffixed by  the superstar’s dialogues. Have you ever come across one as a ‘pure form of art’? Well, Vidyut Jamwal has entered the Bollywood arena to provide you the same. He proved his mettle in his hindi debut movie ‘Force’ (as villain) and has done it again in his first hindi movie as the hero. He is well trained, in absolute control of his body, amazingly nimble and light footed. At last we have an Indian, trained in Indian martial art form ‘Kalaripayattu’, who can hold his own against the international action heroes!

The movie as such is average. Apart from the hero, only the villain, Jaideep Ahlawat is impactful, or rather ‘original’. You do miss the element of showmanship. If given a big production house and international backdrop, Vidyut looks promising enough to deliver a cool blockbuster. He is rightly aged and thus does not look jaded like most of our so called ‘100 crore club’ heroes.

It’s a known fact that, to learn and excel in higher form of martial art, one needs to be highly disciplined and in absolute control of his mind, because while practicing the same, mind also works in tandem with the body i.e. very fast, observing all minute details and making strategies (both offence and defense) in quick succession. So, while practicing their art, the martial arts practitioners look either calm or very focused, unlike most of our heroes who use myriad facial expressions before punching, kicking etc. Thankfully, Vidyut refrains from using such unnecessary facial expressions, which many may wrongly consider as lack of ‘hero type’ attitude.

Chashme Baddoor

Cast: Ali Zafar, Divyendu Sharma, Siddharth Narayan, Tapasee Pannu, Rishi Kapoor, Lillete Dubey, Anupam Kher, Bharti Achrekar, Ayaz Khan

Director: David Dhawan

This movie is a simple ‘boy meets girl – detects certain chemistry – they become a pair – get separated for a little while – they get back’ love story. Herein, backdrop happens to be Goa and causes of separation as well as union happen to be two immature friends of the boy. There is nothing more or less to the movie.

Divyendu’s dialogues created better punches in his debut film ‘Pyaar Ka Punchnama’. Siddharth is a seasoned actor and his spunk does invoke some cetees among the audience. If Ali Zafar is aiming the slot of the leading man in Bollywood, then he needs to tune up his acting as well as screen presence. Tapasee has a fresh presence. It is also refreshing to see a heroine with her ‘natural’ looks, i.e. the look sans cosmetic surgery, sculpting etc. Rishi and Lillete are veterans and they deliver as expected. So does Anupam, but his same style of acting and reactive acting do appear little mundane now.

Contrary to what the name suggests and what they claim in the movie promotion, this movie is not the remake of Deepti Naval and Farooq Shaikh starrer ‘Chashme Buddoor’ (1981).

ABCD – Any Body Can Dance

Cast: Prabhu Deva, Ganesh Acharya, Kay Kay Menon, Salman Yusuff Khan, Dharmesh Yelande, Lauren Gottlieb, Punit Pathak

Director: Remo D’Souza

This movie is an absolute delight for modern dance enthusiasts. Hip hop, Locking & Popping, B-boying, Ballet, Contemporary etc. all are there in finest of display by finest of Indian dancers. To top it all, the protagonist of the movie is Prabhu Deva, the God of Dance in India. To weave the aforesaid dances into a tale, Remo has used a logical storyline, perhaps using struggling instances of real life established/aspiring dancers. But the direction and acting in general is very mediocre.

A chase sequence in the beginning of the film needs special mention. It is kind of a fusion of chase and dance acrobatics. You need to see it to believe it. Most of the dancers present in the movie are popular Indian Reality TV Show dancers. And they have all performed as per expectation i.e. brilliantly. Salman, Dharmesh and Punit have been given special camera focus and they totally deserve it. Lauren from American Reality TV has very good screen presence. She is a terrific looker and dancer. Actingwise, Kay Kay is the only real actor in the movie. But he being a non dancer, very less screen time has been allotted to him.

Special 26

Cast: Akshay Kumar, Manoj Bajpai, Anupam Kher, Kajal Aggarwal, Jimmy Shergill, Divya Dutta

Director: Neeraj Pandey

Pros in this movie: New storyline, Neeraj Pandey style execution, nostalgic trip of late 1980s.

Cons in this movie: Unnecessary presence of heroine and songs, habitual expectation of the audience from a regular superstar.

This movie is true event based and the director has treated the subject with proper r&d and precise execution. In fact you may get nostalgic while watching ten rupee notes printed in black ink, ‘gaddi’ style offices, ‘aangan' centric homes, Air India airplanes and sparsely decorated airport lounges.

The movie is about false CBI raids by conmen imposing as CBI officers who are expert in seizing both apparent and hidden assets (money, jewelry etc.). Everyone has acted well in the film. But Manoj Bajpai needs special mention for his remarkable performance. His entry is rather late, but his histrionics are unbeatable. Like Aamir Khan, every time he performs a pivotal character, he manages to bring something new on the table. Akshay has pretty well underplayed his character. But the kind of superstar he is, you constantly miss what you always expect him to deliver i.e. glitzy romance and action!

In such an intense and interesting movie, you feel impatient when more than the required movie time (read plenty) is allotted to display the personal simple lives of the conmen. That part is neither interesting nor different. Also you fail to understand the purpose of the same. Con activities are both sinful and illegal. So, why the director has tried to generate public sympathy for the aforesaid conmen by displaying their emotional and family side?

David

Cast: Neil Nitin Mukesh, Vikram, Vinay Virmani, Isha Sharvani, Lara Dutta, Milind Soman, Tabu, Monica Dogra, Rohini Hattangadi, Nassar, Nishan Nanaiah

Director: Bejoy Nambiar

Three altogether different stories from three different time periods spurned into one with the common thread being the protagonist named 'David' in all the three aforesaid stories. To justify this common thread, all these three Davids happen to directly or indirectly touch each other's lives (for once) giving it a significant turn! As such the movie has no clear message. At most one can say that therein the name David denotes sacrifices in different forms i.e. of life, career, love and even urge to assassin for revenge!

Individually, all the three stories have been shot good enough, clearly having the time stamp of the period that they depict. The movie belongs to a different genre altogether. The director needs to be applauded to make the brave attempt of trying such a genre in India. But a lot needs to be improvised as well. Watching this movie, many may feel simply confused.

Neil, Vikram, Vinay have all done pretty good job. Isha simply lights up the screen with her presence. Milind, Monica and Tabu are intense and effective in their small roles.

Race 2

Cast: Saif Ali Khan, John Abraham, Deepika Padukone, Jacqueline Fernandez, Anil Kapoor, Ameesha Patel

Director: Abbas – Mustan

Dishy looking star cast without any soul to their on screen characters. This whole movie can be summed up in one simple line!

And now the elaboration – In this movie, each and every character is the epitome of fitness & fashion and each and every frame seems to be straight out of Dabboo Ratnani’s calendar! The director duo have attempted the Hollywood style canvas and storyline, but have been unable to create the magic and energy of their past hits like Baazigar, Soldier, Race etc. Essence of the movie is supposed to be betrayal which is enticing to watch in thrillers. However, it becomes senseless when you watch betrayal upon betrayal throughout the movie. Because of this even some good enactments lose their valor as the audience half believe in their authenticity and eventually their sentiments turn out to be correct!

Entire cast has worked very hard on their looks and build up and in a couple of scenes John and Saif do stand out. But then again those scenes get absorbed in your mind as mere individual scenes and don’t do much to your experience of movie watching as a whole. Keeping with the tradition of the movie’s prequel, Anil Kapoor has been given some corny (read sick) lines and he mouths them with as much of innocence as he is capable of depicting. Youngsters may enjoy this flick just for the looks of it. Audience who are not much into Hollywood movies may also get awed by the display of fascinating (read goofy) technology in the film. But many will feel let down as much was expected from the sequel of high energy flick ‘Race’.