Thursday, January 1, 2009

Ghajini

Ghajini
Cast: Amir Khan, Asin, Jiya Khan
Dir: A Murugadoss
Rating: **

I did not plan to watch this movie. I had an uncanny feeling what this is going to be like. I have never been a big fan of south Indian movies. As i have always felt they lack the finesse which I am looking from films. And woo hoo, I was right. I saw Taran Aadarsh giving a whopping four and a half rating out of five to this flick. I am sorry Taran. You have lost it this time.

Lets see how this one fared in my own yardstick!

I would not give this one more than a mere 2/5...The story was an interesting one and the script does not do justice to it. I was told by my Tamil friends that original ghajini was a mindless flick (though a hit) and it doesn't make sense to remake it in Hindi.. I now totally concur with them.

the weak points of the movie are:

1. the weak dialogues. This movie has got real poor dialogues. especially those by the villain. was a pain.

2. A villain totally notwithstanding this era of movies. He could be a villain of 80s or 90s...not today..so lack of charm or horror. this guy can only shout and not act. he never instills that fear that you need him to do to justify the horrifying memories Aamir bears.

3. Song sequences: Many of the songs fall in to the movie out of the blue. There was no sequence for that Lattu song(an item song for the sake of an item song total rubbish), bachchu song (put in to introduce Asin), behka(to show amir falls in love)....and guess what all are dream sequences...apart from lattu.

4. some important scenes not given importance. Like the scene where asin tells amir she loves him. And amir gives a dumbfound look. He clearly was clueless how to react and so must have been the director. i mean a girl tells you she loves you, u just don't look at her back with that deer caught in headlights look. thats rubbish. another scene is jiya khan comes to hospital to tell amir about ghajini. Amir shouts in agony but where is that agony. all i could see is the round eyes, his egg-head, and jumping in adrenalin. there was no emotion there... there was no fucking drama.

5. Story. well this is the fucking age of Internet you moron. you wanna kill a guy, you don't just go looking for him. you search for him, you google him or you at least look in the directory...you go to his house...anyway even if we decide to take that crap in, the story is loosely bound. That's why there are actually three scenes where that diary of sanjay singhania is read...

6. Amir himself is one of the weakest links in the movie. He has built a stupendous body. hats off to him for that. but so much of muscles has surely not done much good to his brain. the brainy and classy aamir whom we can see even in disasters like mangal pandey, has gone missing here. in places he shows his brilliance. but mostly totally absent.

7. Song shooting. The videos can liven up a movie experience. The way behka behka song was shoot i was really expecting something breathtaking to come as Ghuzharish was still left. But that disappointed me. A classic example why breathtaking locations is not enough to make a music video. The chemistry which cud be found otherwise among amir and asin, was not there in this video. most of the scenes amir is walking, asin is walking...totally unlike Suraj hua madhyam which was shot in a similar location and was shot in the best possible way. again oye bachchu was a okay type song...lattu was a crappo which started brilliantly but then the song is not on screen for more than a minute...and i totally hated that item girl/ med student idea of jiya khan!

8. The plot was fucked up. nothing more i want to say.

Then you may ask what are those two points for if I absolutely hated the movie?

1. Trying to do something different will earn 0.5 points here.

2. Asin will bring a 0.5 points. She looks natural and apart from one or two scenes she's done justice to her character. she's stunning in more scenes than one...and i completely fell in love with a mature yet so kiddish girl. most importantly she doesn't look that sweet sixteen (which she's not obviously) and gives an image of a more of my age girl...which makes the sex appeal ever so great for at least people belonging to my group.

3. In some places amir and asin make a great couple. I want them to see in a better movie. for that 0.5

4. More importantly, although the action scenes were good, they were shot without the emotion. but comedy at places were real good and charming. especially those scenes involving asin.for those action and comedy i gave 0.5.

now then amir fans, wanna give me some blow?

9 comments:

Anand said...

For curiosity sake, how many other South Indian movies have you watched it till now? Could you also name them?

The Ancient Mariner said...

I knew this was coming. My habit of generalisation has spelled doom for me!! :(

i have watched Sivaji the boss, Chandramukhi, Jhillan Ore kadhal, Ghajini, Vettiyadu Veliyadu, Anjali, Telugu: Bommarillu, some more which I can't recal...and many mani rathnam flicks...when I say i don't like most , i spare those by mani!

Ayyappan said...

According to me, Indian films lack the subtlety that I look for.. South Indian films are loud too.. but personally I feel that the Tamil version was a bit better than Aamir's effort!

Sikander Fayyaz Khan said...

I watched Ghajni the other night, and quite frankly it did not live upto my expectations. It surely was an overhyped film. Story was good but execution didn't seem strong enough. It had this 80's and early 90's kind of bollywood feel, with one supposedly scary villan and hero hell bent upon taking his revenge.

Music was really good, and this one song "Kaisay mujhey tum" is simply awesome.

Also, I'm a little confused about the fifteen minute short term memory thing. Shouldn't it be that the memory moves in progression with time? As in when he reaches the sixteenth minute, the first minute gets deleted, on seventh the second minute gets deleted and so on. Instead of a chunk of memory getting deleted upon sixteent minute as if a plug got pulled out.

Anand said...

LOL Sikandar..I had the same doubt after I watched the Tamil version..Maybe it was done to simplify his illness and make it understandable to the viewer ;)

Sikander Fayyaz Khan said...

Andy, turns out they've left two viewers confused. :p

Ayyappan said...

@Siku
Moreover, how does he remember that he has a short term memory loss..
how does he know/remember to rely upon pictures..

Ayyappan said...

@Ankan
Watch some Kamal Hassan movies.. Nayagan.. Mahanadi.. Hey Ram.. Anbesivan...
Watch Vikram's movies ..
maybe that'll remove some generalisation...

Sikander Fayyaz Khan said...

Ayyo, yeah lots of technical loopholes. Also, how does he get a perfect cuts on his head? We all have had wound marks on our heads etc, how do you achieve such perfect stylish lines.