All izz not only Well…….but itzz Awezzome!!

With his new release- 3 Idiots, Aamir Khan would be eager to chant Merry Christmas with the hat-trick of blockbusters after TZP and Ghajini thrashed all box office records in the last two years. Backing him up in his endeavor is the superhit producer-director duo of Vidhu Vinod Chopra and Rajkumar Hirani who has given us the affable desi character Munnabhai. So, the question remains whether 3Idiots live up to all the expectations or just fizzles amidst all the hooplah. Though in bolly-nagri fortune-pendulum swings every Friday, still if promos are any indication then the chances of latter is minimal.
3 Idiots is a satire against the society especially to those parents who overlook their children’s passion and dreams for more stereotyped yet alluring future prospects. Few reels into the flick and the sense of déjà vu surmount any other prevalent feeling at that point of time. While the engineering grads would feel at familiar grounds, others would find something or the other to relate to. The narrative never goes over the top; be it ragging sessions or campus masti, classroom arguments of the idiots and principles’ torch-bearers or hostel life antics, parents’ routine preaching or the romantic angle- everything kept well in control to keep the interest level intact. Ace craftsman Raju Hirani is mighty successful in churning out the best emotions out of one and all the actors throughout the roller-coaster ride. While few scenes prompt you to laugh your gall bladder out, few others will compel you to shed salient water intermittently. Add to it the fact that there were enough twists-n-turns that keep audiences conjecturing, tightly fastened on their edge of the seat. Agreed, few sequences were highly melodramatic and logic-defying which in turn might choke moviegoers’ intestines, but I presume our digestive system has been made immune to all these bollywood-sque idiocy, isn’t it? 3 Idiots is like a voyage that jump-starts with a fresh breath of air, jaunts with a fragrance of lilacs and ends on a summit.

Although, being a superstar Aamir Khan grabs the cake but still he is just the small cog in large wheels of 3Idiots; all the other protagonists gets the role that would grace their curriculum vitae in years to come . Sharman Joshi once again proves his mettle both in rib-tickling scenes as well as in the eyes-drenching ones. Madhavan plays his part as Aamir’s real buddy and gives an astounding act to be at par with other two idiots. As a lone 3 Idiots’ academic-foe, Omi does a superlative job with his cramming hindi recitation. He literally brings the house down with his hilarious “chamatkaari” speech on teacher’s day. Boman Irani continued the legacy of his previous two avatars for Raju Hirani and delivers a breathtaking rendition of obnoxious-yet- astute professor. Kareena excels in the short-n-sweet role and thankfully gives preference to the performance than to her new found zero-figure oomph. Coming back to the perfectionist, its amazing how an 45-year old actor get into the shoes of a 18-20 year old college going bloke, and that too with a customary ridiculous ease. He is one contemporary actor who convincingly tickles your funny bones with his unrelenting humor and also compels you to shed tears or two when he enacts the emotional self. I have made this as the title of my TZP review and couldn’t stop myself to encrypt here too “Take a bow Aamir, Take a Bow!!!”

The music and songs routine is stitched well within the movie and never looked out of context. Unfortunately, Raju as an Editor immolated the best song “Gimme some Sunshine” in the final cut, but still it would be the Youth-anthem for all those who miss their school-college days and want to relive those golden moments of their life. “Aal izz well” is the masti song and already scoring in the chartbusters, “Zoobie-Doobie” fills in the void of romantic number but picturised beatifically to give it a new fervor. “Behti hawaa sa tha woh” is like a rhapsodic ‘General Introduction’ of the lead actor while “Jaane nahi denge” is an elegiac plea to the almighty for the well-being of the friend; full marks to Sonu Nigam for crooning the song in pain-ridden voice.

Harjeet’s Verdict: (Abstaining from all Gyaanbaazi, my verdict would be ‘as fit as a fiddle’ and ‘as straight as a needle’; would surely be the shortest for me till date)
There are few other movies and there is 3 idiots. Watch it for all money and Stay in Peace.

Connubial Journey of 2 States goes haywire!!!

He is an idol to many wannabe desi writers; he is the one who advocates the mantra “live your Dreams and Passion” to the tee; he has made us to believe that best selling fictional books could be churned out through youthful exuberance without any prior degree in the concerned field. The Man is none other than Chetan Bhagat who stormed into this not-so-familiar territory with his all time best book “Five Point Some One” (will be called 5PS hereafter) and followed that up with couple of more viz "One night @ Call Center" (will be called 1N@CC hereafter) and "Three Mistakes of my life". He is back with his new novel which he claims to be “the Story of his own Marriage”. After two previous lackluster novels, the sheen has been going blurred off the Chetan’s otherwise ‘bright plate of success’ and its there to be seen if he is more than one-time wonder. So here comes my analysis which I call my version of diagnosis for the now-Full time Writer Chetan Bhagat’s new novel- "2 States".

The essence of the story has all the Indian-ness feeling in it as cross-cultural marriages has been and still is big deal in Indian society. As a reader, one is very much interested to know how Chetan manages to maintain interest in this otherwise stale concept; whether he overcomes the predictability factor or becomes its victim. Sadly, 2States, with its clichéd story line, kick starts on the wrong foot and ends on the flat note. I am sure all of us have a story or two of inter-caste love-marriages and few of them might be better than the Chetan’s adaptation of the same. FRIENDSHIP has always been the crux of Chetan’s story-telling with embellished “love-tadka” that makes it even spicier. Contrarily,here Love forms the nub of 2States but somehow the Punjabi-Tamilian love saga fails to connect to the readers. In spite of having some Chetan-special punches in 2States, it becomes a ho-hum read as those were hugely outnumbered by few zero-thrill instances, very less wow-moments and almost nil edge-of-the-seat twists-n-turns that make any novel lovable. Being a Punjabi-based-in-South India myself, I could very much relate to the situations, but to say the least, other than few tickles here and there the sequences were far from stimulating. The ‘Super-Climax’ has always been bone of contention for Chetan as he always looks perplexed in wrapping the story for a decent and awe-struck ending. The Good news here is that he did’nt had to face any such quandary; but the Bad news is the climax was always predictable. The writer’s job in such a situation is to make the journey from Prologue to Epilogue a scintillating joy-ride but in 2States all the way through it was just a matter of delaying the ultimate-inevitable.

Prior to this, the stories by Chetan has inspired the Bolly-makers to visualize a movie on it. If, 'HELLO' was a point-by-point adaptation of 1N@CC then upcoming ‘3Idiots’ is loosely inspired by 5PS. But my gut feeling sends a strong message saying nobody would dare to do so this time around, as there are zillions of movies already made based on the inter-caste conjugal encounters showcasing the protagonists’ attempts to win heart of their kins.

Harjeet’s Verdict: I don’t know whether it is a meek coincidence or a genuine attempt, but the title of all the Chetan’s novels’ starts with a numeral. Considering the same as the rating for the books, 5PS still hangs on to the top spot with 5 Rating points and this latest book would boast of only 2 rating points (out of 5). Its very hard to emulate your best work or even come closer to it, but since Chetan Bhagat is now a full time writer, we love to expect an unexpected from the pro. Borrowing your own phrase from the book: 2 states is a complete "Illa something... Something Illa".

DEV D: An Atyacharik Cocktail of Emotions!!!

There were quite a few doubts and conjectures hovering over the fate of this modern-adaptation of perennial character popularly known as Dev-Das, for the simple reason that the man-in-charge Mr. Anurag Kashyap has quite an unimpressive trackrecord so far. His debut product ‘Paanch’ died even before it actually hit the silver screen because of the unavoidable eternal-delay; ‘Black Friday’ succumbed to the over-hype-n-hoopla of contentious issue combined with the jaws of piracy; his statuary warning named ‘No Smoking’ was only understood by the maker himself as it choked the viewers’ thought process and challenged the critics’ credentials to judge the movie. On the other hand, Abhay Deol is basking high on the adulation (critical or otherwise) bestowed over him for Oye Lucky, Manorama-Six-feet-Under and Ek-challis-ki-last-local. So it was interesting to see an end-result of the joint venture by two sons of entirely contrasting fate.
Anurag Kashyap has reinvented the portrayal of an inebriated loser that has been immortalized by first Dilip Kumar and then by SRK. There is slightest of familiarity with the characters; there is Paro who leaves our Dev D soaked in tears cocktailed with Vodka, there is Chandramukhi who provides support to the dipsomaniac and in turn craves for ever-eluding love, then there is Chunni too- the protagonist’s compotator. But that’s all for the similarity sake; the way characters has been concocted with the plot is something worth-praising, add to it the outrageously brilliant craftsmanship by Anurag and you are in for a pleasant surprise. There are quite few experiments as well, viz- typical background music is not used in the movie, instead the songs like Mahi menu,Hikknal, Pardesi, Duniya and Nayan Tarse are used for the purpose. The new music director Amit Trivedi deserves all the accolades for all these different-to-the-tee tracks. After long-long time a song has come that induces applause and whistles both from the masses and the classes; Emosanal Atyachar has already empowered itself as a youth-anthem and is sure shot hit. The cinematography is unconventional that comes from the fact that majority of the flick is filmed at night. The direction is flawless to say the least; finally Anurag makes his mark with his daredevil take on the Modern Devdas. On the flipside, the editing is efficacious in the first half but fails to negate the hangover and drags a bit in the second half. Mentally prepare yourself for few raunchy and sexy dialogues including F word; such dialogues combined with some bold scenes leaves audiences gasping for breath at more occasions than one.
The “Deol with the difference” does full justice to the hot-n-happening avatar of orthodox -Devdas as DEV D. With this new stellar performance to the fray, he further seals his place as a número uno of the so-called new-aged parallel cinema. If he has showcased his humorous self in his last release then here he epitomizes contemptuous nonchalance, self-centeredness, jealousy and impassiveness with customary élan. His impeccable act of devdas makes sure that moving forward, the ‘all-lost-in-love and found-solace-in-alocoholomania’ kinda guys would be epithetically known as DEV D. The leading lady Mahie Gill makes a confident debut and surely is a promising prospect, on the other hand Kalki is handled with care by Anurag in the flick but whether she will find her foothold in Bolly-Nagri is to be seen.
Harjeet’s Verdict: If you are not an hardcore fan of a “typical family entertainer”; If you are game for an outlandish treatment of the eccentric characters under bizarre circumstances; If you are ready to take bulls by horns by witnessing the coming-of-age adaptation of highly conventional love-story, If you are sick of all rosy love stories and want some temerarious attempt to redefine “Bollywood on the rise” tag; If your soft-soothing ears need some hard-on treatment through some bold words instead of covering up beeps; and finally, If you are headstrong for some ‘emotional atyachar’ on your traditional bolly-brainy; then raise a toast for DEV D and scream “CHEERS”. As against lots of IFs, there is only one ELSE:- Stay Away and Be in Peace!