Reviews

Around the time of the movie's release, the film was leaked online with a Censor watermark stamped at the top left. Given the controversy that had plagued the film in the days before, it was obvious who leaked the movie and why. This act of blasphemy made me even more adamant to see this movie in theaters. I can now gladly say I have supported the movie.

Udta Punjab starts off with Tommy Singh (Shahid Kapoor) in a rock concert. In the first few minutes of his appearance, it's clear that this is going to be a very different performance. As Tommy, Shahid is unrecognizable in his avatar with long hair, french beard, tattoos all over, addicted to cocaine, mouthing profanities like the everyday teenager and singing songs that echo lyrics of Honey Singh. His entire character in fact seems to be designed to invoke memories of the real-life rap-star, perhaps to serve as an eye-opener to the youth of today on what they've become "fans" of.

He works with his gang of friends and his "Tayaji", a masterful Satish Kaushik in full form. His drug addiction and vulgar lyrics cost them a singing contract. Angered that anybody could refuse him, Tommy pursues the father-son duo, again mouthing cuss-words and snorting cocaine over a credit card. They manage to give Tommy his first dose of rejection. After a surprise birthday party, he is arrested for substance abuse proudly flaunting his name inscribed on his fingers to the camera.

Meanwhile, in another area, Aalia Bhatt's unnamed character works in agriculture when she unexpectedly ends up with a batch of cocaine. After estimating its worth to be in crores, she tries selling it off to drug-addicted youngsters only for her to be captured, made an addict herself and subsequently raped. Dark stuff indeed. While the scenes have been tastefully handled in that nothing explicit is shown, the performances still chill.

The third plot line concerns a certain cop Sartaj Singh (Diljit Dosanjh). After mostly letting drug suppliers in trucks pass away by extracting bribes together with his seniors, he awakens to the truth when his own brother is found to be a drug addict. He teams up with Preet Sahni (Kareena Kapoor Khan) to treat his brother and end the drug menace once and for all.

As expected, the three stories overlap smartly. I say smartly not only because it's not until the very end that you understand how they will end up together but also because the filmmakers ensure that Shahid and Kareena never share a scene together. A deliberate choice given their real-life history? Possibly.

Bollywood is often accused for melodrama and occasionally, some of the rather flimsy elements do creep in here, more so towards the second half. But for the better part, the narrative moves without a trace of cliché, ensuring that each story has something going for it, giving us characters to root for. You'll flinch when seeing Alia's unnamed Bihari molested and injected with the needle for the nth time as will you want Tommy to mend his ways at a point. Speaks volumes about the film's believability.

The movie has standout performances. Shahid and Alia shine. Shahid as Tommy Singh is simply unrecognizable; he seems to have undergone a radical makeover. So convincing is his portrayal of the foul-mouthed pop-sensation that you'll almost believe he's on drugs himself. Watch out for the scene in prison where Shahid hears from his fans and realizes the horror of what he's inspired. Alia Bhatt also flourishes and brings out her character's adversity and pain very effectively, completely ditching the glam look with a tanned makeup and patchy skin.

Diljit and Kareena offer effective performances too, the former better than the latter. Diljit, the new entrant in Bollywood for once, gives us a Sardar who is not cartoonish but instead very practical, sensible and ironically, one of the rare few who are not on drugs. As is Kareena who gets the most conservative role of the lot, the typical ideal journalist types hell bent on exposing an ongoing racket. Satish Kaushik is the hidden star of the show, the surprise package if you will. With his thick Punjabi dialect, he make you believe he genuinely cares for Tommy despite the a-hole that Tommy is. Other supporting cast is equally good.

The film is believable from start to end. For one, I can't make out where it was shot (mostly in actual Punjab). Cinematography is very natural - there are places so dark you can barely see the actors' faces. It seems very little color grading has been done with the filmmakers preferring outdoor natural light. The film does get a bit slow at times and there are some long takes which you wished were trimmed a bit but it still moves along smoothly given the multiple narratives it covers. Music and background score are spot on, capturing the state and vibe of Punjab to perfection.

Kudos to director Abhishek Chaubey and producers Anurag Kashyap and Balaji Motion Pictures for attempting a project of this sort, bringing to light the plight of Punjab. This is a solid film where Abhishek manages to extract the best out of his actors and his crew. Who would've known of all actors, Shahid and Alia were capable of such, adult, stuff. Despite the dark content of the movie, Abhishek slips in some elements of dark humor, keeping the film engaging at all times.

It deserves a theatrical watch. Films like these need our support so that they can flourish leading to more of them. Udta Punjab's earnings so far indicate it is on track for becoming a Box Office Hit.

I had only just heard of TVF. I knew they were into making spoof videos. I wasn't aware of what Pitchers is. Or the fact that there was a Permanent Roommates before it.

And then, one morning, I woke up to a post on Facebook. I do not remember whether it was a news article or a post share. All I remember is the content: TVF Pitchers had secured a spot on IMDb's Top 250 TV Shows.

At first I was surprised. When did IMDb start a Top 250 for TV Shows. Even more surprising was the thought that if Pitchers had a place here, then it wasn't a spoof video. It was much more. What was it ? I searched, read and quickly realized what it was; a dream of millions of youngsters waiting to be realized that had come into fruition. And suddenly I saw the possibilities; no longer would we have to wait eagerly for the next season of The Big Bang Theory to begin or no longer would we have to wait for Season 3 of Silicon Valley to start. We could have our own. Indian shows, at par with their American counterparts, using Indian history, culture, memes, jokes and situations Indians could identify with.

I set myself up to watch this. But then I thought, following chronology would be better. And so I started, not with Pitchers but with Permanent Roommates. Saw all 5 episodes and quickly realized, yes, the doors have opened. Of course, the Indian version of 24 had proved it. But this solidified it. The possibilities were now endless.

Then I started watching Pitchers. I started with the first episode. In the first 10 minutes ending with the show's opening (the gang of four walking into a bar), it was already a winner. The production values, cinematography, the catchy opening intro, writing, the analogy with beer (brilliant piece of writing), flawlessly smooth editing, it was all there. Right there. And all in the first 10 minutes.

I thought maybe it'll lose its first episode charm. I was wrong. With each passing episode came sequences and situations that were not only believable and highly identifiable but situations that you actually felt with, connected with and reacted with. From Naveen's speech, to the frustrated software engineer Jeetu's outburst, you not only feel every moment but feel like applauding and clapping with them.

There will be a Permanent Roommates Season 2. There will be a Pitchers, Season 2. There will be more shows. But there can be much more. There can be short films. There can be full fledged 2 hour internet movies (at Hollywood Standards so that we can bid Bollywood goodbye). There can even be a TVF's dedicated channel (if the government allows it that is).

But most importantly, this is the beer for all content that will follow. This is it; this is the spark we all needed to realize that yes, its possible. We don't need TV channels, huge production budgets, lots and lots of crew members to make it happen. We need dedication. And with Pitchers, we've seen that dedication. We've seen that quality. More inspiring than its story-line of four friends creating is a startup, is the fact that TVF created Pitchers.

Hopefully, Pitchers inspires people to create. If not a startup, then perhaps several shows that will take Indian entertainment several steps forward. Of course we have Permanent Roommates. And we have Office Office. And the Indian version of 24 (if at all there are more seasons). And we will always have several other shows. But then, maybe in the distant future, Pitchers will be remembered as the show that started it all. Or the one that changed it all for India.

And this, I feel, is why Pitchers deserves a watch. At least once !!!

This was one of those early movies that drew me in to the world of Hollywood. Of course, when I first watched it, I didn't have much idea about what went behind the scenes when making this movie. But now that I do, my respect for this movie has grown tremendously given what it was able to accomplish on such a low budget with such a small set of characters making what could have easily been a B-movie in the wrong hands seem like a solid sci-fi story ending with an epic feeling of the things to follow.

The movie begins with what is possibly one of the coolest title cards for a 1980s flick with Brad Fiedel's iconic Terminator theme playing in the background as the cast is listed in the form of messages displayed from a computer terminal. This is followed by the Terminator and the human making their appearances from the future into our present, gathering clothes and weapons and heading out in their own respective ways in the search for Sarah Connor, a teenage girl part-timing as a waitress upon whose survival rests humanity's future as both she and us learn later. What follows is a cat and mouse game where the human goes all out to protect her and the Terminator is all out to get her and it won't stop, literally right till the end.

What separates this movie (and its immediate sequel) from the "other" sequels is James Cameron's balancing act who, much like Spielberg, allows the story to take center-stage and drive everything else and has perfect control over the length of sequences, edits, camera cuts and angles. 10 minutes into the movie and you're in, drawn to this world, completely forgetting that the futuristic crafts and landscapes are miniatures with absolutely no chance of being drawn out of this world. While I didn't find the characters to be groundbreaking or as interesting as in other dramas, the plot was extremely well constructed and allowed for some really cool paradoxes that would make for some interesting discussion (would John Conner even exist if he hadn't sent Kyle back in time).

The effects deserve special mention too. It is incredible how much Stan Winston's crew and Fantasy II were able to achieve at the time. All the futuristic scenes, the sequence with the Terminator treating his injuries, the chase sequences and the entire ambitious final act all work and some of them still hold up three decades later. And Brad Fiedel's theme gives me goosebumps every time I hear it, as if signaling an impending apocalypse.

All the actors do well in their respective roles, particularly Arnold who shines in a part that seemed almost tailor made to suit his acting capabilities. But it is Cameron who is truly the star of this endeavor, believing in his project and driving it to execution. Thank God for the success of this movie, which gave us many more masterpieces by Cameron. But then, it was entirely deserving of it. A sci-fi tech-noir classic.

Overall Score: 8.0 / 10.0

In a way, it was inevitable. The massive expectations from the sequel to the $1.5 billion grossing and incredibly charming Avengers had shot up so high, the movie was bound to disappoint at some level. And at some level it does, though not to the extent that it can be called a grossly underwhelming disappointment as is being hailed by the media and professional critics. The movie does have its moments, it works for the most part, but just falls short of the first one. In the interest of North American viewers who get this flick a week after international viewers, I'll keep this review completely spoiler free while hoping that it doesn't feel too generic.

The movie's plot, no matter how well written, is pretty standard science-fiction stuff: A robot decides that eliminating humans is the best way to achieve worldwide peace and begins by hatching a scheme to start by eliminating humanities saviors first - The Avengers. That two of the Aveners themselves are responsible for its creation could make for an interesting face off between the creator and the creation. Except that it doesn't.

One of the complains I have with this one is that the dialogue didn't feel as sharp as the first one. In The Avengers, Tony Stark for instance had some amazing lines and so did Steve Rogers. And their banter, while pretty interesting, was entirely in character. Here, both characters seem to have lost their wit / charm. Now fans may justify this as a result of what these characters went through in their respective standalone films but I feel the writing has a lot to blame. Stark's dialogue during the Hulk v/s Hulkbuster fight sequence is an example; his lines are so bland and generic that Downey himself could have done better if he had simply improvised.

Something similar applies to the film's humor; while there were sequences of absolute hilarity amongst the characters in the first film, most of the humor falls flat in this one. All these minor squabbles could have been forgotten if the movie had a great plot. But with something like a robot out for human extinction ending in an equally generic save the city standoff make these flaws stand out even more.

Most movies with a mediocre plot manage to compensate for their shortcomings through some spectacular action sequences. This however, is not Age Of Ultron's strong point either. Most of the action is too heavily edited to be able to follow and the ones you can seem like they were designed by the visual effects crew on an ad hoc basis. And its about time Marvel did away with Brian Tyler and brought a different composer to the mix; the only good themes heard in Age Of Ultron are the ones lifted straight from Alan Silvestri's score in The Avengers and Danny Elfman's slightly modified version of Silvestri's Avengers Theme. Compared to the first one's score which was much more memorable, this one's rather forgetful. And despite a 140 minute runtime, a lot of sequences feel rushed. I guess this has to do with Whedon trying his best to give every character his due and should this movie have an extended edition, it would certainly be one to watch out for.

Now that all the negative stuff is out, here are some of the positives. First off is Ultron and Spader's terrific portrayal of the robotic psychopath (that voice) and Whedon's terrific treatment. Despite his rather clichéd mission, Spader and Whedon make Ultron sound utterly convincing and at times, logical when things are viewed from his perspective. He wants to eradicate humanity so its rather obvious to start with the ones who guard it - The Avengers. Also well done are some bits with Thor's hammer and the following which stand out.

• The party sequence. Thor's expression when Rogers tilts the hammer is priceless (Again, the music sucked; they should've kept the one in the trailers)

• The Vision. He's a welcome addition and his sequences are bound to spark fan debates

• The sequence with the city. Some pretty wondrous effects that had the audience gasping

• The mid-credits scene. Its tiny but pretty significant in terms of plot enhancement. And there is no post-credits scene

• Hulk v/s Hulkbuster. Its good in parts, but not entirely

When The Avengers came out back in 2012, the kind of shared universe cross-referencing was a novelty that made it an event. It was as close to comic books as movies could get in terms of continuity. With so many shared universes announced, it seems that this novelty factor has wore off resulting in Age Of Ultron a good movie but not a great one. It is certainly a treat that comic-book fans owe themselves and the comic-book audience has a lot to cheer for. For the casual moviegoer, this will just be another good movie. Regardless, critics be damned and tomato-meter scores aside, this is a movie you should not miss.

I'm heavily conflicted between scoring this with a 7.0 or a 7.5. I'll stick with a 7.0 for now and revisit the rating after subsequent re-viewings !!!

Overall Score: 7.0 / 10.0

It's an understatement that the films in this franchise are getting crazier and increasingly unrealistic with each successive installment. And Furious 7 takes that to yet unseen levels. But then, realism never really was an expectation here was there ? The earlier films though, were at least grounded in some level to the extent that you could at least believe what you saw if you stretched your imaginations far enough. This one takes believability to, as Roman would say it, a whole new level.

Sample this: After the events of the previous installment, Owen Shaw's brother, Deckard is out for revenge against Toretto and his crew. To get to them though, he needs to know where they are. So, he breaks into the DSS' headquarters (which looks completely desolated with only Hobbs and Elena working there) and into Hobbs' computer scanning for information on their whereabouts (which, as we were led to believe from the previous installments, were erased with the crew receiving full pardons). He then begins taking them out one by one starting with Hobbs (who Shaw manages to injure badly so as to land him in a hospital) and followed by Han (which connects the franchise to Tokyo Drift) and then Dom and Mia (who barely manage to escape). In the middle of all this, comes a terrorism plot about a certain "Mr.

Nobody "who is after a device codenamed "God's Eye" that can turn any camera into a tracking device of sorts allowing its owner to spy on anyone. A terrorist wants to use it for his personal gains but to do so, he requires the assistance of the device's creator - a hot female hacker named Ramsey who Mr. Nobody wants Dom and his crew to rescue since only she knows where the device is. All of this is of course, carried forward by the franchise's trademark over-the-top and highly unbelievable set of action sequences, fast race cars and even bikini-clad chicks in a scene or two.

The series seems to have settled on a formula of sorts with a silly plot governed by cringe-worthy lines of dialog relying on its action to do the talking not to mention the amount of times the term last / final is used in the franchise (One Last Ride, One Last Mission, etc.). While the set-pieces here are good enough, they lack the awesomeness of the ones in Fast Five and Furious 6 (which is gonna be hard to top with a tank and a plane). The final sequence drags on for so long with actors doing nothing but mouthing search and rescue dialogues amidst heavily inter-cut action I stopped caring about the outcomes of the characters themselves. The fight sequences too seem to have seemingly odd camera angles as if the director of photography ran out of angles to shoot from.

Why then, have I rated this movie a 6 you wonder. That's because it all does come together to create a decent entertainment package. But more importantly, this is largely due to the tribute to Paul Walker at the end that, unexpectedly, feels so heart-wrenching its surprising. After all, its a Fast & Furious movie; it isn't supposed to be this emotional. But the cast give such a fitting send-off to Walker's character in movie it resonates largely with the real life situation. As for the CGI Paul Walker that some people seem to be cringing about, except for some shots in the end, I honestly couldn't make out which shots used his digital double in the film (I did have some guesses but they turned out wrong).

I do believe that a lot of the high praise that the movie is getting has to do with this being Walker's final movie as also to the tribute at the end. Otherwise, its a fairly average action movie with a brainless plot that at times, reminded me of the crazy Bollywood movies that a lot of people criticize. Given the money its making and the fact that this is Universal's most reliable and only huge franchise for now, I won't be surprised if we get one of these every two years for the next decade at the least. Watch it, if nothing else, For Paul !!!

After the Munnabhai movies and 3 Idiots, it is natural to have mammoth expectations from a Rajkumar Hirani. A movie that hits you hard, delivers a strong message and makes the public question some age old conventions and beliefs, that's what his past movies had (some of them in bits and pieces, others in spades). PK though, is the strongest of his efforts on that front.

PK is about Aamir's character (named PK by the public) arriving from a distant planet on earth on a research mission only to have his "remote control" stolen. This remote, is the sole means by which he can summon the spaceship that brought him here to get him back. Without the remote, he is essentially stuck on earth. He slowly starts learning the nuances of earthly culture and language and gradually moves closer towards finding the remote. He also realizes from the public that it is God alone who can help him find it. In the process, he ends up questioning and challenging the religious belief system that India has built involving multiple religions, each with their own set of traditions.

That last part is what hits you hard about PK. The fact that there is only one God, the true God, the one who created us all unlike the many Gods that exist and are worshiped on a daily basis is something worth taking home. Also, by this time, I wouldn't call PK being an alien a spoiler since this is very much clear from the start of the film itself (and in fact, is something that the screenwriter Abhijat Joshi has heavily hinted at in a Plot Summary written by him on IMDb).

Aamir is spot on with his portrayal of PK and one almost feels that he's back in form after the disastrous (but still financially successful) Dhoom: 3. His performance is again going to be a talking point for months to come and perhaps, may even land him the Filmfare yet again. The others complement Aamir well enough especially Anushka, who, despite having considerably fewer films under her belt almost feels like a seasoned performer by now.

But the laurels all go to Rajkumar Hirani and Abhijat Joshi for the wonderful script and direction; the script has so much material it moves at a break necking speed, never quite running out of events or situations. The crisp editing allows them to pack in a lot of stuff without it taking way too much time. The romance could have been toned down a bit as it was the only part that felt a bit unnecessary but in the end, that is a minor quirk in an otherwise outstanding effort. Shooting in real locations in Delhi such as the Red Fort and even a metro station lends an authenticity to the film that sets can simply not achieve. The music is strictly functional though and unlike the "Give Me Some Sunshine" song in Hirani's 3 Idiots, such a hard hitting number is missing.

For a country like India with an over-surge of religions, languages and traditions that sometimes border on meaninglessness, PK as a movie is an eye-opener. Sure it has its cheesy moments and it may not exactly be a "complex" piece of art in the league of Terrence Mallick or Christopher Nolan movies. But in an industry like Bollywood which is plagued with commercial no-brainers from one Khan after another, PK is not only a strong film, it is a laudable effort. I'd recommend every Indian to watch this film at least once and wake up from the nonsense that is being served in the name of religion to truly realizing what God is all about.

Overall Score: 8.0 / 10

In a certain sense, The Battle Of The Five Armies could very well be to The Hobbit series what The Matrix Revolutions was to The Matrix Trilogy. With a battle occupying the center of the film and the title, chances of there being less story to tell abound. And after viewing the movie, I can understand why critics don't really like it.

From a critics' point of view, the movie has all that makes them cringe. It has an overabundance of visual effects in an attempt to recreate the epic battles of Jackson's prior trilogy. It has that clichéd love angle / triangle. It has deaths where every death appears a melodrama in itself. It has more connections to the Lord Of The Rings than you can count, effectively making it as a bridge film rather than a standalone one.

But then, I'm not a critic. And so, despite all of the above being true in a way, I still enjoyed the film. Yes the movie has a lot of visual effects and clichéd moments. But courtesy Jackson, the clichés manage to make an impact and the effects still appear spectacular. And this, in an age where CGI has made it notoriously difficult to please audiences is a great achievement. Yes, the deaths appear melodramatic. But having been with the characters since the last two films, they also touch you. Yes there are connections to the decade old Middle-Earth trilogy. But these connections only deepen the impact of every scene by making you realize what lies ahead.

Jackson was right when he said this film moves almost like a thriller. The editing is tight, the effects are a spectacle (it would be a shame to watch this first on a laptop / desktop and not on a big screen), and the music almost feels like the culmination of a six-film saga that began a decade ago. Howard Shore masterfully mixes different themes connecting this not only to the previous movies but to the Lord Of The Rings movies as well.

It was always my desire to see the first trilogy in theaters, something which I never got to do. With the Hobbit films, I have at least been able to witness Middle-Earth on the big screen. This may very well be Jackson's final foray into Middle-Earth and for this reason alone, if nothing else, it is worth seeing. Now let's hope Warner plans a Lord Of The Rings re-release in 3D.

Saucy, eh ? If at all you're familiar with Christopher Nolan's style of film-making, watching this will at once make you realize where it all started. Its also of course possible that it began much before this but since much of that material isn't accessible to the public (save Doodlebug), we'll never really know. For all purposes, Following remains Nolan's feature film debut and it surely is a remarkable achievement.

The story follows Bill, a struggling unemployed writer who takes a liking to following people in hopes of finding material to write about. This liking soon turns into addiction forcing Bill to set rules to allow him to restrain his activities. One of the rules which he ends up breaking, is following the same person twice. The person with whom this rule is broken is Cobb, who soon confronts Bill about being followed. As it turns out, Cobb is a burglar who enjoys robbing people, not for the money, but rather for the sheer pleasure in taking away things that people took for granted; his belief being that it would make them realize what they had. Taken away by Cobb's lifestyle, Bill becomes a partner in his burglaries which is where the trouble begins.

Digging any more into the plot would serve to spoil the complex mystery that Following is. Following has a lot of those narrative structures that would become trademarks of Nolan's directorial style (intercuts, close-up inserts, non-linear editing, multiple chronologies, and so on). Nolan and crew were forced to make certain hard choices to obscure the severely limited budget, one of which was shooting the film in black and white. Of course, the plot was such that these decisions worked the film's favor. The film's incredible naturalism repeatedly comes to mind while watching the film. This is due largely in part to the film being shot hand-held, with scenes filmed in a take or two to save on film stock. The behind the scenes material with the film reveals this and other fascinating details about the film's production such as the crew shooting over weekends due to their jobs on weekdays as a result of which the film took a year to complete.

Despite the low budget, you're always hooked on to Following and that is due largely in part to the film's plot and tight writing (another of Nolan's strengths). Unlike many filmmakers who use lavish editing styles and gimmicky display effects, Nolan's films rely primarily on story and screenplay to get the viewers attention (with the occasional non-linear editing thrown in to really keep the audience alert at all times). Add to it, the intriguing characters which have personalities so distinct it appears Nolan himself followed a handful of people to get the traits right. Jeremy Theobald is as natural as the gullible Bill as Alex Haw is suave in the role of Cobb. And the chemistry between the two is so natural, it makes most of the dialogues they say seem improvised, as though real people were conversing.

Following is a great start for Nolan who has now moved on to bigger, elaborate and definitely better projects. It is a lesson for aspiring filmmakers that even with a limited budget, it is possible to make a feature as interesting, riveting and thrilling as some of the best noirs of the early 40s. While it may not be perfect, most of the limitations it suffers from are largely due to production values rather than plotting and pacing. It is nevertheless, a must watch for anyone who has even the slightest of respect for Christopher Nolan's film-making.

Overall Score: 7.0 / 10

There's a sequence in the movie where Harleen (Katrina Kaif) has been taken hostage / abducted. Rajveer (Hrithik Roshan) runs frantically to catch up to the bad guys taking her away. However, the bad guys have raced pretty far ahead. Just when all hope seems lost, Rajveer comes across an F1 racing track and spots an F1 car being off-loaded from a truck. The next thing we know, he's driving the F1 car along the streets of Abu Dhabi cutting across cars and traffic until he finally catches up to the bad guys. And this, is the moment where we hear the now famous score from the teaser play in the background.

Yes, Bang Bang does have its moments. And all those moments are in the action sequences. But action is all there is to Bang Bang. You'd think that after the disjointed effort that the Tom Cruise - Cameron Diaz starrer Knight And Day was, the filmmakers would use the opportunity of a remake to make the plot more interesting, connected and a bit meaningful. Turns out they didn't (in fact, with the emphasis on the romantic angle, they've only made it worse). You'd think Bang Bang's editing could be smooth as compared to the chaotic way in which Knight And Day was pieced together. Turns out this is equally chaotic with the film slowing to a crawl in the romantic sequences between Hrithik and Katrina (most of which contain dialogs that come across as highly cliché) and speeding up rapidly in the action sequences so that they're over before you even know it. I guess once a flop, always a flop.

Rather than lifting the plot straightaway from Knight And Day, this official remake gives the plot its own Bollywood spin. Thus, the MacGuffin here is a diamond (Kohinoor) instead of a perpetual energy source and (without getting into spoiler territory), the theme of revenge takes over. Also, the opening sequence has been reworked a bit so that instead of Knight And Day's plane crash, we have Hrithik meeting Katrina via an online dating site. Katrina's character Harleen is a simple bank receptionist who hasn't had fun for most of her life even though she wants to. Desperate to meet her knight in shining armor, she registers with an online dating site for a date with Vickee Kapoor who, the site reports as her perfect match. Of course, Vickee doesn't turn out for the date and Rajveer instead makes an appearance. Smitten by Harleen, he pretends to be Vickee and thus begins one of those drab Bollywood conversations that eventually ends up in the two falling for each other followed by a song and then a fight scene.

And thus begins the chase. Only this one has more romance than action (the action comes and goes pretty quickly even before you notice). Bang Bang suffers from the same problem that most Bollywood action flicks do; while the action looks good for a trailer, it appears disjointed on film so that the jump from one sequence to the next does not appear well connected. Why is the Kohinoor so important ? How does it serve its purpose (as revealed in the end) ? Why is Omar so feared ? Where does he come from ? Now I'm not saying that all these need to be explained exposition style. But in a 150 minute movie, some more detail would have only made things interesting. Add to that the songs which only make you wonder why they were needed in the first place. To serve as promotional material perhaps.

Hrithik does well in a drag script while Katrina irritates for the most part. Whether its her role or her performance, I can't say but she surely makes Cameron Diaz look like a legend. Director Siddharth Anand handles the action sequences decently enough with The Amazing Spider-Man 2's Andy Armstrong serving as action consultant. The film is shot well and while the songs are unnecessary, the music is generally good (both the mainstream and the background music). Salim-Sulaiman seem to have perfected the art of background scoring Bollywood flicks.

One only wishes that more attention had been paid to the story and screenplay. After all, these were the same issues that plagued the original Knight And Day off which this is based. Sadly, those issues plague Bang Bang as well. What we thus get is a well packaged but lame remake of an already lame movie which, with some fine tuning, could have translated well for Bollywood but does not. This is pure high-quality junk.

Overall Score: 5.0 / 10

Now I guess a lot of people are simply going to "Disagree" with this review once they see the rating and the heading. After going through a lot of the reviews posted on this recently, I get the trend - you hate this movie even a bit and you have 20% of the audience disagreeing; you love it and 80% agrees with you. While I'm not at the end of either side as my score illustrates, I do believe the movie is slightly disappointing.

This being a Superman movie and the board being filled with Superman fans, lets not even discuss the plot. Instead, I'll straightaway get to the points. To begin with, here's what I liked about the movie:

Action & Effects: As much as the critics will bash it, I'll admit the action in the movie is simply spectacular, very literally of epic proportions and quite out of this world. In fact the trailer of this movie has more action than the whole of Superman Returns and the trailer contains only about 5 - 10% of the action. The best scenes are in the end when you see Superman flying at breakneck speed and slamming Zod - intensely gratifying.

Story & Script (If I understand the term Script correctly): Nolan and Goyer wrote and conceived the story together with Goyer then writing the screenplay. I must admit that this is definitely a very unique take on Superman, the likes of which we've never seen in any Superman movie or comic. The ideas presented are interesting and one plot point gradually leads into the next instead of scenes being forced. And the ending is simply brilliant.

Performances: Shannon as Zod is exceptional. Cavill as Superman is also intense. And both the fathers add their unique paternal touches. Everyone else plays their part convincingly.

Score: Hans Zimmer. That epic score running in the battles scenes. It doesn't get any bigger and better. Enough said.

Now, onto the dislikes:

Zack Snyder: I seriously didn't like his direction. He overuses Zimmer's score, inserts random flashbacks and focuses much more on action when instead he could have given time to characters like the Kents, Perry and Lois (though she does get a lot to do). Although the story had the world "reacting realistically" to Superman's arrival, we rarely get those moments save one or two shots of people staring in the sky reminiscent of standard disaster flicks - meaning, nothing different. I guess Nolan in the chair could have made a huge difference.

Cinematography: The hand-held work, while good enough in the action scenes, totally sucked during character interactions. I mean, when Jonathan is talking to kid Clark, the camera shakes so much to make it "seem real" that it looks like those scenes were shot with a Galaxy SIII with stabilization turned off. I doubt shaking the camera that much was the best way to achieve realism with the 3D making it even worse. Steady camera shots focusing on the actors could have a more powerful effect if not more.

Miscellaneous: Characters rarely get beyond a point (lets hope there's more of that in the sequel). The only exception is Zod who is far far better than what he was in Superman II - and yup, you actually empathize with him. The first meeting of Lois and Clark is not what people would expect and hope for (yet seems to be the only way to progress the story forward it seems). The "realistic" portrayal they were so talking about seems completely lacking as well.

So many hits and yet so many misses. While Man Of Steel is certainly a good movie, it was destined for greatness which it never manages to fully achieves. This, and not the movie, is the reason for my disappointment. Nevertheless, it certainly deserves a watch on the big screen. The action alone is worth it.

Score: 6.5 / 10

Fast & Furious over the last few installments has become all about action. And the latest outing takes it a step further. Almost 20% of the movie is comprised of action sequences. And at the expense of action, plot, writing, characters all take a backseat. But no one's complaining. Why ? Because the action makes up for all of it.

Do the above statements sound cliché ??? The movie's plot is full of such silly dialogs so its best ignored in the current context. What works is the action - Lin and his crew bring us some of the most ridiculously outrageous and boldly conceived action sequences. There's an intense chase through London in the initial reels and also a race later on. There's a whole plane take-off-crash sequence towards the end that you've probably got a glimpse of in the trailers. The girls are no slouches either and we see an intense hand-to-hand fight of sorts between Michelle Rodriguez's Letty and Gina Carano's Riley.

But the movie's best sequence is undoubtedly the 10 minute Tank chase across the freeway that involves most of the cast and culminates in a breathtaking "catch" (about which I'd not say any further). The camera cuts like crazy, music is pulsating and that single sequence is probably worth the price of the movie ticket.

Apart from action, Furious 6 doesn't have much going for it. Dialog is standard, at times even silly and predictable, characters are flat, performances are decent. The car chases and night scenes got me so involved, I actually felt a bit strange leaving the theater and coming out into the real world's broad daylight. And the post-credits scene is simply, a treat which makes the next installment in the series worth looking forward to. Suffice it to say that in the end, the movie drifts full circle.

Watch it for the action, and for the action alone. If you expect any sort of character development or family issues like the first installment had, you'll be disappointed. Else, you're in for one hell of a ride.

Score: 7 / 10

We've all seen the trailers. And we've all probably built up a certain vibe about the movie - that its taking the dark route a.l.a. DC movies. So, if it doesn't end up living up to that vibe that its built around itself, its bound to disappoint viewers, mildly or hugely. Because in this case, the dark route actually seemed like a perfect fit for the third installment.

Sample this: After the events of The Avengers, Tony Stark suddenly realizes that there are other supremely powerful beings in existence, that he's not alone, and that when compared with the others, he's certainly not the strongest of the bunch. So he develops post-traumatic stress, starts getting anxiety attacks, and in the process has built himself an army of suits - an Iron Legion - all because he just doesn't feel safe anymore. This causes friction between him and everyone else he knows - between him and Pepper and their romance, between him and Rhodey and their friendship, and between him and Happy affecting their bonding. Lots of room for exploration there right ??? Add to that, an emerging terrorist threat in the form of The Mandarin whose organization, The Ten Rings was alluded to in the first movie and you have an opportunity to bring things a full circle. The Mandarin being Iron Man's most prominent foe in comic book legacy only helps.

But sadly, it looks like the movie doesn't care to exploit all of these to their fullest. I'm not saying it doesn't use these issues at all, Tony's vulnerabilities are played out brilliantly. Its just that they could have done so much more with this material and the trailers gave us reason after reason to expect that they have that we end up a tad bit dissatisfied or should I say even mildly frustrated. And the pacing of the movie is quite feverish which isn't a problem if the characters are involving enough. But when they keep spurting out one-liners after another with a comic intent, it gets a bit irritating. Again, I'm saying a bit and not hugely irritating.

There's no reason to scoff at the movie's production values. In fact, being a Marvel movie, I shouldn't even be commenting on how amazing the visuals are, or with Black at the helm, the action is top-notch. It would simply be wasting characters in this review if details are described. But yes, the airplane crash and the subsequent fall sequence deserves mention - its the only sequence in the movie that gave me real goosebumps. I'd say that sequence makes up for some of the movie's flaws never mind the brief duration that it last's for.

Downey is at the top of his game here. He plays a more mature, sensible and disturbed Stark unlike the jolly good alcoholic of the previous movies. However he does retain his sense of humor which is good in a way but not so good when done excessively. The girls get little screen time but give in their best. As for the bad guys, they're all effective and any further comments on their performance would mean spoiling a big twist in the movie.

With Iron Man 3, Marvel's Phase II has begun. And while this may not be the best of starts, its certainly not a bad one by any means. A little bit of fine tuning and even sticking to the vibe the trailers projected would have made this movie a serious force to bicker or reckon with. As it is though, Iron Man 3 is a pretty decent summer flick. Just don't expect anything extraordinary out of it.

I was about to give it a 7, but I'll raise the score by 0.5 for Downey's performance and for the airplane sequence.

Score: 7.5 / 10

In a vast seemingly endless landscape, Jak travels on a bike surrounded by what appears to be the remnants of the Manhattan Bridge. In another shot, Jak's Bubbleship circles a destroyed football stadium which hosted the last Superbowl before the alien invasion that destroyed earth. These are simply two of the many shots that you see in Oblivion showing a ravaged Earth circa 2077. And they're a sight to behold no matter the countless times such sights have been and shall continue to be shown on celluloid. The effects blend in seamlessly and after the initial few shots, it ceases to matter what's real and what's digital.

For a futuristic sci-fi that claims to be original (and it is if Kosinski's unpublished graphic novel by the same name is considered just that: unpublished), Kosinski nails the look and atmosphere. But then, Kosinski's already done that in Tron: Legacy, his last outing, which was no less of a visual achievement by any means. Fortunately, at least for me, this one comes out to be a tad bit better than his previous attempt.

Jak Harper and Victora a.k.a. Vika work as a team with Vika serving as the operator and Jak handling the drone maintenance work on Earth: repairing drones that have been programmed to destroy any alien life on sight. Earth was destroyed in an alien attack 60 years ago and while the humans won the war, the planet was sabotaged beyond habitation. On one of his routine missions, Jak encounters a flying object that crash lands on Earth. It turns out that there were five objects housing humans with one of them resembling a woman Jak has been seeing frequently in his dreams. Jak rescues her and the real story takes off from there.

Joseph Kosinski takes the simple route and has the film begin with a narration by Cruise explained the aforementioned scenario. Perhaps he chose to do it because the film already has plenty of surprises in store in the second half and as such, there was no need to obscure Earth's current situation. As expected, the movie feels like a well polished product in all departments. Cruise, Olga and Andrea turn in pretty decent performances despite having no distinct character arcs to follow. Cruise in particular gives in a very, shall I say, sincere performance playing it low key. Freeman essays his cameo with ease. The Zimmerish music does get a bit repetitive and generic but manages to keep the tension at appropriate levels which suits my tastes so that'll be a plus for me. And thankfully, the movie refuses to go all out into Haloesque action mode for a long time with the action being interspersed and well spaced and most importantly, kept to as much as is required and no more.

What you will take in the end with Oblivion are the visuals. Lets face it, by the time the whole movie ends, you'll realize all the plots elements have been borrowed from a flick or two in the past. But these days, its not only about an original plot but an original execution. And for a movie that's not a remake, or a sequel, or an established comic book or adapted novel, Oblivion does the job. It may not be an Avatar but Oblivion is decent enough for a one time watch. And going by the visuals, that watch is best suited for the big screen.

Score: 7.5 / 10

A word of advice. Watch this movie straightaway without reading anything about it. Most of the plot summaries you'll go through will mostly end up ruining the movie for you. Its incredibly short (about 3 minutes) so even if it ends up sucking for you, it wouldn't have in any way hurt to devote 3 minutes to what I find a great start for a by now famous and master craftsman Nolan. Heck even a visit to the loo takes more time so giving 3 minutes to this movie without any second thought shouldn't be hard enough. Let the bug surprise you.

Doodlebug came to my attention when doing a bit of research (that isn't the right term but I'll stick to it anyway) on Christopher Nolan now that his final movie in the Batman trilogy is about to hit out. It appears he made two more shorts before this of which one named Larceny, I've heard a lotta praises about but sadly couldn't manage to get my hands on it anywhere. So I decided to started my Nolan filmography with this one. For the meager amount of money, this movie is quite a watch. Excellent camera-work, nice editing which keeps the movie flowing smoothly (and not much like Nolan's later non-linear works), good effects for a short (that's just me though) and a decent performance make this worth a watch. Now I don't exactly know what messages this movie wished to convey but I do know that those were some entertaining and insightful 3 minutes into what was to come in the future from this guy. Following's up next for sure.

It's now an accepted fact that the first Star Wars is regarded as one of the most, or amongst some communities, the most successful movie of all time both in terms of critical acclaim and box office gross. Attempting a sequel to a movie of such magnitude, while an exciting prospect from the movie goers' perspective, is a suicidal task for the crew behind the same. One can only imagine the immense pressure of expectations that the makers of this film would have gone through while making this movie and even more so when the movie eventually saw the light. However, this movie not only fulfills all such hopes that fans of the first movie would have from the sequel but takes the Star Wars franchise into an even better and exciting territory, and improving upon the minor flaws of the first, turns out to be an adventure that can be regarded as good as perfect in all aspects of film-making. Although I had gotten a slight hint of this from the forums and internet talk, I now realize why this is regarded as the best movie in the Star Wars universe.

There's little need to get into the plot as it is best experienced by watching the movie directly. To describe it in short though, Darth Vader is desperately after Luke Skywalker and wants to turn him to the dark side. In an attempt to capture him, he plans to use his friends Han Solo and Princess Leia as bait. Meanwhile, Luke, guided by Obi-Wan Kenobe's voice through the mystical Force must travel to Dagobah where he must learn the true ways of a Jedi Knight in order to confront the evil lord Darth Vader.

Once again, all the elements that made the original Star Wars a success abound in the sequel. There's a well conceived story put together in place, great writing and editing that makes all the sequences feel connected to each other allowing them all to flow together, there's the original cast giving better performances this time being more aware of their characters, and of course, there's the by now famous Star Wars opening musical piece. Lucas, busy handling his newly established visual effects house and finances, hands over the directorial reins to his trusted professor Irvin Kershner. A professor at the University of Cinema Sciences, the way he handles the epic sequences while at the same time concentrating on expanding and developing the characteristic traits of the main cast gives the film an emotional depth which was sorely lacking in the original movie and which was one of my complaints with that film - the characters there were appeared too flat and devoid of personality as though they were just going through the motions. The presence of some character development this time allows us to connect with them even better which in turn makes the situations in which they get involved in a lot more engaging. Amongst all, the character of Han Solo as a dependable "scoundrel" is what really stands out; Ford plays him out in a near perfect way which is not only consistent with what Solo was in the first film, but also takes it in a further positive direction. His sequences with Carrie Fisher as Princess Leia are amongst the high points of the movie and are brilliantly played out. We also see Mark Hamill as a now slightly more mature Luke Skywalker as he journeys to Dagobah to learn the ways of a true Jedi from the strangely voiced Yoda. And of course there's the inseparable duo of C-3PO and R2-D2 who are actually forced to stay apart from each other for a major portion of this movie. As much as I can admit to not being able to understand anything R2 says, I have inexplicably grown to like his presence immensely in Star Wars.

The film features visual effects and action on a scale that's almost twice as big as its predecessor (the budget only confirms this). Spending $32 million on a movie in 1980 would not have been regarded as a wise decision but thank goodness that Lucas decided to go for it or we might not have been able to witness space battles on such a huge scale. The battle on the ice planet at the start of the movie is brilliantly staged and a behind the scenes documentary sheds some light on how some of these miraculous shots were achieved. What's really great about the action is that unlike the heavily edited action sequences of present films wherein the average shot just lasts for about 2-3 seconds, shots in Star Wars last longer making the action very comprehensible and easy to follow. Its easy to see the strategies being adopted by each side while fighting as opposed to units just being brought down by random shots fired by people / creatures obscured by the miss-mash editing. And the best sequence of the movie comes towards the end in an epic battle between Luke and Darth Vader that literally will send your pulse racing. Even more exciting is the battle's infamous outcome which I shall not reveal.

Movies like The Empire Strikes Back come only once in a while. Perhaps, every decade must have only a few of these movies present. Fans would obviously come up with a few nitpicks here and there but as far as my opinion goes, this movie is perfect in every aesthetic and area of film-making I'm ever aware of. Now that this movie has set such high standards for the Star Wars saga, I wonder where the next movies will take me. Suffice it to say, The Empire Strikes Back strikes a positive blow from which recovery is simply not possible. A winner all the way !!!

Score: 10 / 10

I can't believe I've missed this all these years. This has got to be the movie phenomenon of perhaps, the century. From what I gather, almost every avid movie watcher is in some way or the other aware of the existence of something called Star Wars. Today, I took the plunge to experience it first hand courtesy the arrival of The Complete Saga on Blu-Ray.

What makes Star Wars powerful ??? Is it the characters ??? Not for me. I believe its the well fleshed out story, which looks like it has been adapted from an extremely detailed novel of sorts. What also worked according to me was the development of the movie's narrative - it just flows smooth as silk with no such points existing in the movie where the director has none of the universe's story to share and has just added fillers. There is never a dull moment in Star Wars - it all moves one sequence after the other and they all connect so wonderfully that you're left mesmerized. The characters and performances in my opinion are not bad but they're not as good as the aforementioned aspects. And I trust that these are only going to get better in the movies to follow now that they've been successfully introduced to the audience.

Needless to say, the film is a technical marvel. And any praise of the film's technical prowess has to be incomplete without a mention of the film's visual effects. That Lucas could even dream about filming these ambitious sequences three decades ago is remarkable. There's a behind the scenes documentary which shows the making of some of these sequences. Its a must watch for those wondering over how visual effects were done in the good olé' days. The shots are truly breathtaking and so is the editing - everything's wonderfully put into place. Its hard to believe that the first cut of this movie was considered to be a shoddily edited piece of work.

The first time I heard the Star Wars main theme, which in the movie was right at the beginning surrounding the opening crawl, my jaw almost dropped. This is because here was the tune that I had been perhaps hearing since my childhood at innumerable award functions, events, advertisements and other such situations but I never actually bothered to investigate its source. I used to believe that its a tune which must have been specially composed for the Oscars, then recycled into being used elsewhere. The theme can best be described as uplifting - and John Williams, a maestro.

Missing out this movie meant missing out on one of the most brilliant movie experiences of all without even being aware of it. No amount of talk related to this movie is enough until you've seen it for yourself. I won't get into plot and cast details here because I'm confident that with the presence of so many reviews out there, these must have been taken care of countless number of times. I just felt that I needed to write out the excitement that has gripped me after watching this film - an excitement and curiosity about what the other films hold in store. Its not a perfect film and its certainly going to have its share of detractors and bashers. But this is one film that should be bashed only after its been given a fair trial. And there's a fairly slim chance that you'd wanna do that once you've seen it. This movie has introduced and involved me into the Star Wars universe. And now, I'm off to The Empire Strikes Back the next week !!!

Score: 8.5 / 10

A glimpse of this movie's trailer at a suburban mall is what caught my attention. It seemed like an interesting concept - apes taking over the world, getting intelligent. More research revealed that this is actually a part of a series (although not in a direct way) about apes ruling a planet. Information gave rise to curiosity and finally turned into enthusiasm which is when I decided to give this movie a shot. And it didn't disappoint.

The story should be familiar to people aware with the series - a new drug is being developed by a scientist Will Rodman to cure Alzheimer's. The drug is tested on a chimp who is killed while trying to defend her baby. The baby chimp then inherits the mother's genes and intelligence which develops far more than what the drug's maker's anticipated. What's interesting is the way this movie has been presented to people who are unfamiliar to the series - no worries, you're not at all gonna feel out of place. So, you definitely don't need to go through the previous movies to watch this one.

There's little of character development or outstanding performances here (excepting the main chimp Caeser that is who gets both of these). What makes the movie work at least for me is the writing and the direction. Watch the scene when Caeser defends Will's Dad. Endearing and mesmerizing. The effects are awesome as well. Its hard to believe that so much could be achieved for a relatively small budget (about $90 million). I guess when it comes to top notch visual effects at a relatively low cost, Weta is the one to approach. They could create a whole planet in Avatar for $237 million, the whole Lord of the Rings trilogy for about $300 million and also did the aliens in District 9 for $30 million. Need I say more ???

The movie has a really fresh feel to it - it has that typical summer science-fiction feel to it yet it is much more than that. It only runs too short - a little more time, say a run time of about 2.5 hours would have given the movie enough time to establish the characters and would have made it a masterpiece on the lines of Peter Jackson's King Kong. Its perhaps because of the short run time that Freida Pinto's and James Franco's characters get limited screen time and scope to perform. Nevertheless, for all that it is, this is a great summer movie with an outstanding performance by Andy Serkis as Caeser and a technically sound film in all departments (cinematography, VFX, production design and the likes). In short, its all that I expected it to be. If you do not have a problem in suspension of disbelief, I strongly recommend this movie !!! Score: 7.5 / 10

Its here. The moment we've all been waiting for and the moment we've been secretly dreading. For believe it or not, the fact is, that there might just not be any more Harry Potter left after this movie. The books are over, and with the latest Harry Potter installment, the movies are over too. And so, with Harry Potter, we've all entered adulthood.

First off, the movie was great. With the rave reviews it has been getting, I was of the opinion that most of these might have been given out of sympathy and an emotional attachment to the Potter franchise considering that we bid goodbye to him and his circle of friends with this. But the movie actually deserves all the applause its been getting. What struck me as different about this movie is that it has a constant feeling of movement - a feeling similar to what you get when watching Christopher Nolan's masterpieces like Inception and The Dark Knight. Even in a scene which could otherwise have been a simple dialog taking place between two characters, the background score gives the impression of movement - which in turn gives you the on-the-edge-of-the-seat feeling that you usually crave for in movies. And irrespective of whether you've read the novels or not, you're surely going to enjoy this movie because you are well aware that this is it, it has to end here. Either Harry has to die, or Voldemort will. Or maybe both ??? I'm not going to mention anything about the story lest I inadvertently manage to reveal a spoiler. Suffice it to say, that Harry, Ron and Hermione continue their quest of finding and destroying the Horcruxes and hence attempting to destroy Lord Voldemort and in their quest, are joined by almost every character we can recollect to be on their side since the inception of the Potter universe. For those who ain't read the novels, the plot is still simple to follow since most of the explanation bit has been done in Deathly Hallows - Part 1. For those who have, they've according to me included almost everything they could from the novel. Dumbledore's past has been left out and the sequence of events and the manner in which they take place in the ending slightly altered but apart from that, its like watching the novel come to life.

The recent Harry Potter movies have become increasingly dark, not just tonally, but also visually. The visuals are great although the darkness sometimes makes it difficult to see what's going on in the screen. I'd imagine the 3D to have an even worse effect which is why I saw the movie in 2D and apart from the opening logo and the ending sequence, I could not see how the movie could have been better in 3D than without it. The background score is simply excellent - just hear the bits playing during Snape's presence; they're haunting. The performances have come up too and again, although Fiennes as Voldemort gives us a scary act and Radcliffe, Grint and Watson are commendable as the trio, the best performance comes from Alan Rickman portraying Severus Snape. His eyes alone manage to convey a wide range of emotions, in some cases, with the rest of his body standing still. Its sad that he has less scenes in the movie. Just like Severus Snape, Rickman here proves to be the secret star of the show.

On the minuses, the movie is incredibly dark. Of course, considering that all the action happens during the night, it should rightfully be so but nevertheless, this makes things happening on screen sometimes, difficult to follow. Also, with the time they had, they could've easily extended the movie by 10 minutes or so and included all of Dumbledore's past. That would have added for some interesting character study from a movie's perspective and it would have ensured inclusion of the whole novel in the movie at just a few extra minutes of screen time's worth - something Potter fans and even non novel readers would not have minded. Besides, they should have shown how some of the characters who get bumped off (yes they do) have died instead of just showing us their dead faces. What is bugging is that they actually were cribbing of time all this time along and this movie being 130 minutes approximately, they could've gotten enough time (in fact all the time they needed) to put in those extra scenes which would have only enhanced the movie.

I've been preparing to watch this movie for months (three to be precise). I've been reading up all the novels and watching all the movies again. It is while reading the novels for the first time that I realized what I did miss on in all those years of my childhood. Nevertheless, the last few months feel as if I've been living in an alternate universe myself. And finally, I was able to watch this movie while having read the novel before hand - something which I wasn't able to do all these years. And now, its over. I have a hollow feeling inside me telling me that its all over - the event which I've been mentally preparing myself for 3 months is over. Nevertheless, it was an enjoyable experience while it lasted. An of course, who knows, they might re release all the Potter films in 3D later on. Which reminds me, who's stopping us from re-watching and re-reading Potter all over again. For what it is, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 2 is a ride that's fun, scary and filled with a tinge of sadness. As a sort of a bonus, you even get to see scenes from the previous Potter films. A must watch. Long live Harry Potter. Longer live Severus Snape !!!

Score: 8.0 / 10

The producers / distributors / makers (call them what you may) behind this movie have decided to transition The Fast And The Furious Series of movies from a street racing franchise into an action / heist one with car chases at its helm instead of the notorious street races that governed most of the previous movies. Had I not watched any of the past movies, I would have certainly welcomed this move. But after seeing all four of them (in anticipation of this one), I believe that leaving out street racing from this movie was not a pretty good idea - there's just one race in this movie and that too, is a friendly sort of no stakes race. Although I can understand the studio's motives behind doing so, The Fast And The Furious series of films deserve at the least one race per film.

Anyways, enough of the complaining already. Coming to the point, which is Fast Five, the movie is surely fast and equally furious. The fourth movie ended with Paul and Mia attempting to bust out Dom from prison with an animated escape shown in the end. The fifth movie begins just at that point with a live action escape sequence replacing the animated one at the end of the previous installment. After a job that goes awry, the trio are then on the run since they're wanted by two factions of people - the crew of a businessman Reyes and the team of a DSS agent Luke Hobbs. After running around for some time, they decide to pull one last job to buy out their freedom with fake passports and start life afresh. But with these two powerful men on their tails, it ain't gonna be that easy.

Fast Five is more of an action movie and so, for it to work, there has to be action. And there is - plenty of it. Without spoiling most of it by describing it in detail, I'd say the high points of the movie are the train job at the start that goes awry and sets up the events of the movie, the trio's escape from both teams who get to them simultaneously over rooftops, a fight between Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel) and Luke Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson) and of course, the finale which is absolute madness. And perhaps all of the sequences have been shot without any use of CGI which is what makes the action even all the more exciting and brings back memories of the past era of action movies where all sequences were filmed rather than digitally created.

The cinematography is top notch as well. Although there are a lot of cuts in action sequences, we still get some long continuous areal views of the action (long meaning lasting around 5 seconds or so) which helps understanding what's going on and where it all fits into the surroundings. This ensures you're with the action. Performances are decent and for a mostly wooden Paul Walker reprising his role as Brian O'Connor, you have a surprisingly flexible Dwayne Johnson playing Luke Hobbs - the new entry in the franchise. His character is exactly what he told it would be in the behind the scenes featurettes - strong, efficient at nabbing criminals and a worthy antagonist to Dominic Toretto and his team mates. I'd definitely want him to return in the next installment. And although this ain't a movie about characters, we get some dialogs which actually help us understand the characters a little better giving us some insight into their lives. Nothing deeply psychological - just a tinge of what's hidden beneath the surface. Nice.

On the whole, Fast Five is solid entertainment provided you're willing to suspend your disbelief and forget the laws of physics. But then, we always do suspend our disbelief to some extent in movies - that's what they're for. And none of us really does remember the laws of physics so they're irrelevant for the most part. In which case, the movie comes highly recommended and even more so for an action movie buff. This is the definitive action movie of the year. And do stay for some time for a nice post credits surprise which unlike many meaningless sequences, is a critical post-credits scene that might set up the next installment in the series.

Score: 7.0 / 10

It's been an overdose of fantasy for me in the last few days I guess. First, in anticipation of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part I, I watched all the previous ones at a stretch. For this, I had to do a similar thing. Else how would it make any sense ??? The Narnia series, it seems, is shaping up to be the replacement of the Harry Potter series. We all know that Harry Potter is gonna be done with by the next year. That will leave us with the Narnia series, and with four more movies to go, I suppose that's gonna last a long while till another fantasy movie series pops up.

The movie begins with the Pevensies being transported to Narnia "least when they expected". This time, they have their cousin Eustace with them who takes some time to accepting the Narnian world filled with talking creatures and other such wonders. He reacts similar to how the Pevensies did when they first saw Narnia, only he's more scared than surprised. Since they've landed in Narnia unexpectedly, there has to be a reason for it. And there is, and a supposedly good one - one which will not only test their battling skills what with dragons, serpents and storms on the way, but also bring them face to face with their inner demons and fears.

As far as the similarity of the movie's plot with the book goes, I frankly admit to having no idea regarding that. I've viewed the movie as a movie, as a sequel to the first two and as such, won't be able to comment on how well the movie follows the plot of the book. On the surface of it however, the plot is fairly basic but filled with too many characters to confuse someone who isn't familiar with the books. All the cast members perform well though the star of the show has to be Reepicheep the mouse - he is so endearing that you'd often find yourself rooting for him. And then again there's Aslan the Lion who, in my opinion, is the best (CGI) wonder ever created in the Narnian movie universe. His mere presence in a frame makes it stand out. He appears responsible, wise, calm and like a father figure to the Pevensies and others - the character is so greatly conceived that his mere sight makes you respect him. He truly has the aura of a king and rightfully deserves to be one. And Liam Neeson does a fabulous job of voicing him as do the animators on making him appear life-like. And when the soft and soothing background score plays in the background during his presence, you're bound to feel a lump in your throat. You'll definitely hear a child scream "Aslan" in the movie theater when he first arrives.

Visually, the film is simply outstanding. Such is the richness of the effects that it makes me wonder how on earth can the film be made on a budget of "just" $140 million. I mean, the amount of visual effects present in the film and the quality of each shot is simply brilliant - from the dragon to the serpent to the wide shots of The Dawn Treader to the Islands to the waves to Reepicheep the mouse and finally, the great Aslan. Lighting, it seems has improved to the point that it is difficult to tell what is CGI and what is real. The main musical themes have been recycled from the past films which is a great thing since those themes were simply heart touching, especially Aslan's. The set design is also good although as mentioned, it is hard to distinguish between real and digital sets.

Like many movies with excessive VFX, the movie tends to give a slightly more focus to the effects (maybe because it is a children centric film). Although made for children, adults shouldn't find this a reason to stay away from the movie. The movie might tend to get a bit boring at times. And the biggest drawback of the movie is the 3-D which, quite simply, is as good as not there. By all means, you'd be better saving some bucks and watching the movie in 2-D; it might as well also save you a headache. As a matter of fact, the commercial shown during my movie screening had better 3-D that that found in this movie. Despite its drawbacks, it is a good movie and can make for a good viewing with / without family. If not for anything else, I recommend it, For Aslan !!!

Score: 6.5 / 10

Fresh and Energetic. If I were to describe this movie in two words, the aforementioned ones would be it. Right from the first scene itself, you feel as if you've been sucked into the world of high school student Peter Parker. And you realize that it's not as bright and nice as it should've been.

The movie serves as an origin story to Spider-Man. It shows the transition of Peter Parker from a nerdy, butt-of-all-jokes high school student, to a slightly more confident and arrogant personality to, eventually, a responsible superhero in the form of Spider-Man. No point in discussing the plot here as its fairly predictable and spilling the beans here itself would make it more so. Sam Raimi's direction is excellent and the movie is a thrill ride from start to end. The performances are utterly convincing. Hats off to Tobey Maguire, after viewing this movie, I'd be hard-pressed to recommend any alternative for the role of Peter-Parker / Spider-Man. Kirsten Dunst is also convincing as Mary Jane Watson - the next door neighbor and childhood crush of Parker. So is Willem Dafoe as Norman Osborne - the businessman who later on, after experimenting with a performance enhancing drug in a laboratory, turns into his alter ego, the Green Goblin. And so are the others.

The film is great technically as well with its brilliant cinematography which has the camera swooping up and down buildings and New York streets at a breathtaking speed. The art design is also great and has been used appropriately to handle and provide us with some memorable sequences (special mention goes to the Unity Fair sequence at Times Square). The visual effects, while good, are something which I found below par at times (again note some of the shots of the Goblin at the Unity Fair sequence; it's clearly evident that there's some mixing and matching being done here). Maybe this was because of the color schemes of the lead characters because of which they had to be shot separately which may have been responsible for this. Danny Elfman's music is also very good; the best piece being the opening theme.

What is so endearing about the movie that it has a heart and soul of its own. It becomes clearly evident while watching the movie that the makers of the movie are extremely passionate about Spider-Man. And that passion is visible in every frame of the movie - be it the action sequences, the characterizations or otherwise. It has become difficult for me to imagine another team behind the future installments of this movie. Before viewing this movie, I only knew about Spider-Man from some of the cartoon shows that used to appear on Television about him. Now, after seeing this movie, not only has my interest in Spider-Man sky-rocketed, but I consider him to be the most intelligent and the best superhero amongst the lot of fictional superheroes. Fantastic stuff.

Pixar, it seems, have seriously become a force to reckon with. It all started with Toy Story in 1995 and since then, they've consecutively delivered masterpieces after another as if to virtually remove all doubt that Toy Story was a fluke (and no, it wasn't one). The next in line is Toy Story 3 which, quite easily, joins the ranks of Pixar's finest movies (though I'm now struggling to recollect which one wasn't).

In Toy Story 3, we see that Andy is about to move to college. He has to pack up his toys in the attic, donate them, or trash them (that's the choices he has). While he decides to go to the first option, the toys, through a series of misadventures land up in Sunnyside - a place where they'll have plenty of kids to play with them. But all is not as well as it seems since the kids are far from what Andy was when he played with the toys - they thrash them, mercilessly pound them and mess the toys up - enough to make the toys decide to go home.

The best thing about Pixar movies (despite the fact that they're animated movies) has been the characters - something which other movie makers need to learn. Although Toy Story 3 excels in almost every department, the characters are never lost in the background. We still care about the likes of Woody, Buzz and Jessie which is surprising considering that we know they're just pieces of toys. And the voice acting is just incredible. I thought Tom Hanks would have lost his form after all these years and was wondering whether, despite aging 10 years, he'd be able to voice Woody with the same enthusiasm he did back in the previous two Toy Story movies. However, he does a brilliant job at it and so does the rest of the voice cast. It'll make you feel as if the voice recording for the movie was done 10 years ago.

Technically, the film features CGI which is amazingly impressive. There are times when you simply forget that this is an animation movie you're watching. In fact, just like in WALL·E, the only times the CGI looks CGI is when humans show up (which is perfectly understandable given that it's incredibly difficult to make human CGI). Watch the opening sequence to get what I say, it alone is enough to convince anyone of the visual superiority of this movie. Cinematography and Editing are also flawless, the movie never slows down and it feels that there's something constantly happening in the movie. Humor is again good - especially the scene in which Buzz turns into Spanish mode. Hilarious !!

Just like it's predecessors, the most amazing feat of Toy Story 3 according to me is how it makes you emotional and sad towards it's end. It's a perfect example of directorial triumph. And this happens at a time when the characters in the movie just exchange glances at each other, they don't even speak much in that portion of the movie. It's strange to realize you'd become sad by just looking at toys without they saying anything. Without revealing anything all I can say is that the first thing you're likely to do after watching this movie is go home and check out your old toys. You're surely going to miss them - at least I did.

My only gripes with the movie - I'd have loved to see more of Rex, Hamm and Slinky Dog. Rex's lack of confidence is something which came across as wonderfully in the first two movies. That is something that I missed. Also, the humor is less stronger as compared to the first two movies and so are the dialogues. Those are my thoughts. These tiny nitpicks shouldn't deter anyone from watching this movie. And yes, the 3D was simply pointless. I actually wanted to watch the movie in 2D but couldn't since all major movie screens are showing it in 3D. That made it clear that the 3D was more for the purposes of generating revenue than for anything else.

And yes, it's time we accepted that these movies are NOT movies for Kids. They can be enjoyed equally by Adults as well - in fact more so. It's high time people stopped slamming these movies as movies for the kids and skipped them. If you're one of them, you're missing out on something really important here - something you'll regret 10 years from now for sure. Watch this Pixar !!!

Score: 8.5 / 10

Finally, I managed to catch the much awaited Indian flick Kites. I must make it clear that I watched the movie a week after it's release by when it had received a truck load of negative reviews. Almost everyone I spoke to suggested that I give this a miss. But, considering that I don't usually consider critics' reviews as a deciding factor in my selection of movies, I decided to go ahead and watch it thinking that I might as well see what's so bad about it myself. The end-result - it wasn't that bad but it definitely wasn't as good as I was expecting it to be either.

The plot goes thus: J (is that Jay / Jai / simply J ???), is a street-smart carefree dude who manages to make a living in Vegas by performing stunts and marrying women to provide them with Green Cards in exchange for money. He's looking for that one big moment - that will change his life forever. And he manages to stumble across that moment when he realizes that Gina (Kangana Ranaut), who is madly and obsessively in love with J (Hrithik Roshan), is the daughter of Bob (Kabir Bedi) - a millionaire and the owner of a highly profitable casino (business). J manages to impress him and gains an entry into their family where he meets Gina's brother Tony's (Nicholas Brown) fiancée Natasha (Barbara Mori) (who it turns out is one of the women he married for a Green Card). Sparks fly, they fall in love, and decide to leave all the wealth and elope (sort of). The rest of the movie revolves around Tony deploying his forces after the couple and the twists and turns that follow.

The problems with Kites are many. First of all, the plot, although looks detailed, is fairly thin with huge plot holes. Agreed, almost every movie has them but a whole lot of movies (especially Hollywood movies) at least try to induce an element of believability to the goings on. Kites doesn't even come close to achieving that. Then, the writing is something which I found to be extremely inconsistent as far as pacing goes; the movie proceeds slowly in most areas and then, all of a sudden, it moves extremely fast at the pace of a thriller. This is best visible towards the end when the movie literally becomes a roller-coaster ride. How I wish the movie had such a pacing throughout. Perhaps such consistent pacing could have helped. Also, the Hindi subtitles can detract from the experience and serve as a distraction. They would've been better in English.

Many people here have complained that the first half of the movie is slow and disengaging. I'd disagree on that. In fact, I believe the first half of the movie has more substance than the second half - which largely consists of chase sequences. Plus, the moments between J and Natasha during the second half can get quite boring since neither are they engrossing nor do they offer any character development. Anurag's direction may not be really at fault here, in fact some sequences are handled really very well (for me these were the opening sequence, scenes in the first half and the ending). The ending really worked for me - without revealing anything, I would say that this is the sort of ending that I had actually been expecting from the current crop of movies since a long time.

Of course, Kites does have it's share of pluses as well. For one, the cinematography is simply top-notch giving it the feel of a Hollywood movie. Editing is also good although despite its short length, it could still do with some more trimming (Kites: The Remix anyone ???). Music is pretty average and sometimes boring though the background score is excellent (especially the Spanish / English song which plays in the background and is prominently heard through most of the trailers). Action is commendable, even though it comes with it's own flaws. The movie plays out with alternating flashbacks which makes for a good experience and also provides the viewer with a fair amount of suspense, keeping you guessing.

The performances are again a low point. Hrithik pitches in a dependable performance as usual. His dance sequence in the Fire song is to be seen to be believed. Kangana does good (though I don't see how her role is a guest appearance) and so does Barbara. The rest are just caricatures. Dialogues are again quite poor. Neither do they pack some punch, nor do they feel natural. And of course, the much touted sex scene between Hrithik and Barbara is over in a flash - it almost becomes a blink and you miss it affair.

On the whole though, in case you're considering to watch Kites, I'd recommend that instead of making a decision based on reviews of other people, you watch the movie for yourself and decide. Kites is a fairly good movie and is commendable for it's effort and the intention of it's makers. If you ask me, I'd say that although it has many shortcomings, it still should be worth a watch. (Now am I seeing a thumbs-down on this review already ???)

Score: 6.0 / 10

I had heard about this film since quite a long time. My first thought was that could an "Animation" film supposedly created for kids work as a science-fiction movie for me ? After realizing the positive reception that this film had garnered, I decided to watch this. It would be a first for me in the sense that this was the first animated feature film that I would be viewing. And now, after having done that, I'm glad that I stepped into the territory of animation. WALL·E is not just a fun-filled animation movie meant for kids. It is at par with any feature film featuring big stars, sets and budgets ever made and is much better than most of them.

The story is mainly told through visuals (although quite a bit of dialog creeps in during the last hour) and is best deciphered by the viewers themselves instead of being explained in such a review. It's set about 700-800 years into the future when Earth is in a mess, mankind has settled into space and the only moving thing left on Earth is a robot named WALL·E - this should more than suffice. Although there are no dialogs for a major portion of the film, it is much simpler to understand yet gets more complex as you start analyzing it in detail. This kind of treatment comes across as far more effective (at least for me) than say the one in 2001: A Space Odyssey which relies heavily on visuals leaving almost all of the deciphering to the viewer. As such, WALL·E is as simple or complex as you perceive it to be (although for the most part, it is the former).

Despite having a short running time, the film packs in much more than many 2+ hour extravaganzas and credit for this must go to the writing, direction and editing - all absolutely first rate. The screenplay is packed in with twists and turns that rarely do we come across moments where nothing happens on screen. Some people have criticized as the opening minutes of the film boring - WALL·E apparently simply goes about doing his stuff. But according to me, those sequences do exactly what they're meant to do - they not only provide us with a glimpse of the everyday life of WALL·E (which is boring and mundane) but also gives an insight into WALL·E's loneliness as also the fact that he longs for companionship. The editing is flawless and one scene just flows into the next (many scenes spring up a surprise or two as well).

Technically the film looks polished and the first twenty minutes will leave you wondering whether you're indeed watching an animation film or a shot live-action one. It's only when the humans enter the picture that you realize that its animation. The lighting in the future earth sequences is so live-action Esq, it makes those sequences all the more appealing. Just looking at the principal characters, you can see that it has taken a lot of effort.

The main reason that the film works (for me at least) on such a huge level is (besides the story and treatment) is the main character WALL·E. He is simply put the perfect representation of an endearing, hard-working, polite yet cute robot representing humility and empathy. And his eyes are probably his best feature - they are so expressive that WALL·E doesn't need the mouth, shoulders, or even words to communicate or express the emotions that he goes through - the eyes say it all. In short he is the star of the film.

WALL·E works on any and every level you want it to. What then is disappointing about this film ? Not much except that I was really looking forward to the music in the trailers being a part of the film and was heartbroken to find out that it wasn't. Also, the future humans could have been a bit better - they look far too cartoonish especially when compared to the film's look in the earth sequences. I guess I've become used to complaining which is what makes me feel as if something's missing from a movie. On the positive side, I believe this prevents me from rating a movie 10/10 at the drop of a hat. Nevertheless, these complaints do not take away from the fact that WALL·E is, in almost all aspects, a superior film and should not just be dismissed as an animation film meant for kids - it has a good message hidden inside it. And yes, this film has allowed me to open the doors of my mind to a new genre of movies - animated films. For me, Toy Story's next.

Score: 8.7/10 (Rounded off to 9/10)

It certainly is all over town. Aamir's next has been hyped immensely and it's not surprising if you are not able to find a movie ticket this weekend. But at the end it all boils down to the question - is the movie worth all the hype ?? After watching it, I can say that the answer (quite disappointingly) is no.

Two college friends - Farhan Qureshi (R. Madhavan) and Raju Rastogi (Sharman Joshi) embark on a journey to find the third friend / Idiot Rancho (Aamir Khan) who mysteriously disappeared after college five years ago. The film's story is told through flashbacks as the characters journey to Shimla in search of Rancho - the person who managed to change their outlook towards life.

The problem with 3 Idiots according to me is that although it tackles a very complex issue, it chooses to do so in a light-hearted way which essentially converts this movie into a comedy (something present in abundance in B-Town). No doubt the humor is top-notch and keeps you rolling in laughter but the movie simple fails to connect you emotionally with the characters as opposed to, for example, Taare Zameen Par (2007) which I feel, after watching this, is far more superior in terms of characterization and emotional depth. By the time it reaches the climax, you can well anticipate almost everything that would happen.

As for the performances, they are top-notch. Undeniably, Aamir is one of the finest and this movie reaffirms this. However, what most people seem to be forgetting is that there are two more actors in this movie who, given the opportunity, are as capable as Aamir themselves. First R. Madhavan as Farhan Qureshi is simply brilliant. Watch the scene wherein he tries to explain his point of view to his parents. Next, Sharman Joshi as Raju Rastogi really shines not just in the comic sequences but in the more serious ones (which the movie has very few). Revealing the sequence in which he shines may act as a potential spoiler but watch out for a scene in the principal's office in which the principal asks him to type a rustication letter. Kareena Kapoor is really a thorn in this movie and her romance with Aamir is something that should have been either toned down or chopped off. Omi as the ideal geek is impressive (more so than Kareena).

The cinematography is good and breathtaking in the opening song where the lush greenery of Shimla is captured with such finesse that it induces a sense of wonder. The music is good but the songs have not been used that effectively. For instance, "Give Me Some Sunshine" not only has weak choreography, but it comes at a moment which severely reduces its impact. The promo featuring that song was far superior (in fact that was what fooled me into believing that this movie could end up as a masterful lesson in life). Some of the sequences could have been trimmed down.

On the whole, although 3 Idiots is a good movie, it is hard to understand people calling a masterpiece or a breakthrough in cinema. Movies like Taare Zameen Par (2007) or even Hirani's own Lage Raho Munnabhai (2006) are better movies as compared to this. Nevertheless, the movie does provide some really good entertainment so if you're looking forward to just relax and chill out, go for this. For those however seeking some serious depth and a perspective in the life of an engineer, I'd say the movie tries and succeeds in parts but an engineer's life and the pressures s/he faces are a different game altogether. Although the movie it enjoyable, it is far from authentic. And this comes from an Engineer (although an Idiotic one). Now I may get a lot of sore thumbs down on this one but this in my opinion on this movie written in all earnestness. Don't enter this movie with high expectations and you may perhaps find that All Izz (Indeed) Well !!!

Score: 7.0/10.0 !!