Thursday, January 31, 2008

Only Human

Leni (Marián Aguilera) brings her fiance home to meet her eccentric Jewish family. Her boyfriend Rafi (Guillermo Toledo) is bewildered by the depressed mother, nymphomaniac sister, religious brother, blind grandfather and the missing dad. Then there is the added issue of his being Palestinian. A hilarious film that does have it moments where it leaves you ROFL.

Rating: * * +

Lower City

Deco (Lázaro Ramos) and Naldhino (Wagner Moura) are childhood friends who run an illegal cargo transport operation in a dinky boat off the Brazilian coast. Their cargo one night is a young vixen, Karinna (Alice Braga). The payment is a roll in the sack for each of them. The roll finds them careening out of control from their close friendship into a nightmare of lust and jealousy.

The presence of Alice Braga and the fact that the film was produced by Walter Salles, who directed Motorcycle Diaries, were the main attractive points of the movie. But they both fail to deliver. Alice for one looked so much hotter in City of God and Walter should stay away from such mundane plots.

Rating: * +

Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Land of the Blind

A political satire set in a unnamed democratic country ruled by a fascist president, opens with a young impressionable guard Joe (Ralph Fiennes) taken in by the ideas of a political prisoner (Donald Sutherland). The words and the country's downward spiral spurs Joe into action only for him to discover that power does indeed corrupt. A tightly scripted movie that emanates crisscrossing echoes of past and current political climates.

Rating: * * *

Monday, January 28, 2008

GITS:SAC: Solid State Society

Another superb installment of the Ghost in the Shell anime series, based on the manga by Masamune Shirow, shows us Section 9 with all our old friends sans the Major. Togusa heads the field ops and a slightly ailing Aramaki now walks around with a cane. A rather subdued and depressed Batou continues to strut around obsessing over the development of the Tachikomas.

The group is confounded by thirteen suicides of terrorists without any rhyme or reasons. The only connection they have is the mention of a wizard hacker called the Puppeteer. Batou soon discovers the Major floating in the periphery of the investigation and the ride is on...

In spite of being the weakest installment in the series it still held true to the high standards set by its predecessors. If the review is making no sense to you it is best you start at the beginning and then you will know that before Trinity there was Motoko Kusanagi.

Rating: * * +

Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Head-On

Cahit (Birol Ünel) meets Sibel (Sibel Kekilli) at a clinic when both are recovering from suicide attempts. Cahit hates his life and Sibel seeks liberation from her strict Turkish family. They soon drift into a marriage of convenience with the only bond being that they are both Turkish immigrants living in Germany. But then marriage is never about convenience...

Rating: * * +

A Prairie Home Companion

Robert Altman directs an A-list of high powered actors and actresses cast as the members of one of America's highly popular radio shows. The supposedly quirky and funny look at the behind the stage scenes of the show led me to think about what should be added to the noodles that were being boiled for dinner.

Rating: +

Sunday, January 20, 2008

Bheja Fry

A fairly funny movie - with competent performances all around. Comedy of Errors type. Rajat Kapoor plays a bored yuppie who along with his friends, take the piss of an unsuspecting soul every Friday night to entertain themselves. And this time its the idiot's turn to bheja fry. Good to see Sarika back.

Rating: * *

Rescue Dawn

Christian Bale's character finds himself in trouble when his flight gets shot down in Laos. The communists capture him and puts him in a makeshift prison along with a couple of other American soldiers and American sympathisers. While it seems that the spirit of the others have been broken, Lt. Dieter Dengler is not ready to give up and escapes the prison. A true story and impressively made as it focuses on the right things - about a soldier plotting to escape in trying circumstances. One notch higher does rise Christian Bale.

Rating: * * +

The Heartbreak Kid

An ore the funny Ben Stiller movie. His character realises soon after his marriage that he has made a mistake and falls in love with another woman on his honeymoon. Chaos ensues. A good movie to catch on a flight.

Rating: * *

Sophie Scholl

Sophie Scholl a member of the White Rose - a student rebel group in Munich, Nazi Germany that aimed to raise awareness about the evil ways of the Third Reich. White Rose decides to take the anarchist step of circulating rebel leaflets in the University. Sophie and her brother get caught in the process and thats where the movie begins.

Bulk of the movie shows her being interrogated by Nazi officials and how she steadfastly tries to con them - which was fascinating and ore the outstanding performance by Julia Jentsch. Sophie cant save herself from her inevitable fate but does not bow down. There is critisicm around that the movie did not spend much time in the lead up to the incident; the general social situation etc. Honestly, I have seen enough of that and instead quite liked the focussed approach.

Rating: * * *

Fracture

Came highly recommended as a slick suspense flick. Turned out to be a cliched twist-in-the-tale movie. Ryan Gosling and Anthony Hopkins cant do much with the script, except make some money out of it.

Rating: * +

Flight Plan

Jodie Foster rescuing her child yet again - this time its on a plane. Full on action thriller.

Rating: * *

Love in the time of cholera

I take responsibility for the decision to watch this trite - but honestly, no one would have expected such shit. Ever. Saw Javier Bardem & the director of Donnie Brasco in it and thought it should be decent. The movie began and realised that all conversation was in English which was fucked up; and the acting seemed out of primary school. Then the moment I saw Benjamin Bratt's face after 20 odd minutes, figured it was time to exit the theatre. Somebody got it horribly wrong.

Rating: *

How to make an American Quilt

This used to be in my "must watch" list in the early 90s - as one was going through ones Winona Ryder's days. Having just watched it, figure that it should have been viewed in the early 90s only. It had all the important ingredients - lots of elaborate discussions on relationships, and ofcourse a confused Winona Ryder. A reasonable movie, but after a while it all seems a saccharine coated memory pill.

Rating: * *

Comedy of Innocence

A child suddenly realises he belongs to another mother; leaving the current mother very hurt and light headed. The child knows where his original mother exists and takes his current mother to meet her. And then it gets very bizzare - since the fathers too busy, the current mother's abrasive brother tries to sort the matter out. Which results in a lot of bizzare comedy; but dont know where the innocence comes in. Trust the french.

Rating: * +

Wednesday, January 16, 2008

12 and Holding

Twelve year old Rudy's (Conor Donovan) murder splinters his tight group of friends. His twin brother gets busy plotting revenge. Overweight Leonard (Jesse Camacho) who narrowly escapes dying with Rudy finds the road to fitness much to the chagrin of his fat family. Beautiful little Malee (Zoe Weizenbaum) discovers the opposite sex. And as a group, the three teenagers wait for the concrete to break their fall.

Rating: * * *

Monday, January 14, 2008

Cheeni Kum

Buddhadev (Amitabh Bachchan) is an arrogant and garrulous chef at a London restaurant. For the viewer, his nasty temperament is made even worse by an annoying ponytail. Nina (Tabu) sees beyond Buddha's idiosyncrasies and dances her way into his heart over a plate of zafrani pulao. The 30 year old age difference is not a problem for them but is a giant issue for her dad (Paresh Rawal).

Tabu is ravishing in the film. To top it off her character is one that is not often seen in Indian cinema... a single independent woman in her early thirties who is comfortable with her life. The love between two people with a huge age gap is also one that most Indian audiences are not comfortable with. So the ingredients for a spicy movie are all in place but if only the script had been massaged a bit more and AB's part was given to Om Puri...

Rating: * +

Achuvinte Amma

Achu's (Meera Jasmine) world is dominated in a good way by her enterprising single mother (Urvashi). The film offers a small portal into the rare world of a single mother in Kerala. The camera lens tends to focus more on the mother and daughter relationship rather the social pressures a single mother faces in India. But in spite of the restricted arc, the manner in which the director explores their relationship calls for very good viewing.

Rating: * * +

Tuesday, January 08, 2008

Rasathantharam

Mohanlal dons a realistic throwback role for a change in this film. He plays a simple down to Earth carpenter, Prem, who does not throw villians to moon after spouting idiotic dialogues. He leads an idyllic life with his father (Kodiyetam Gopi) which is rudely shaken by a wave of sympathy and pity for a servant girl, Kanmani (Meera Jasmine). Kanmani is practically a slave in a household and her sorry plight moves Prem to help her out. But we all know that most people are punished for their kindness though it is with a dose of cunning humor in this case. The only gripe I have with the film which was moving down a lighthearted path is the rude infusion of melodrama and sentiment.

It is heartening to see that an albeit overweight Mohanlal can still act. Meera Jasmine is very impressive and I hope to see more of her. Kodiyetam Gopi too has done a stunning job in spite of the stroke that has affected his left side. Malayalam cinema needs more films of this nature to take it back to its glory days.

Rating: * * +

Oram Po

After being jostled about in autos in almost every metro in India it is evident that the driving skills of the auto-drivers in Madras are a touch about the rest. This film proceeds to highlight that very fact. Chandru (Arya) is a footloose and fancy auto-wallah with some serious skillz. His heart soon starts to beat in rhythm with that of Rani (Pooja - Warning: sultry and dusky hotness ahead). Throw in a money thirsty Seth, some missing precious stones, couple of feuding auto mechanics, a few crazy races and you have a flick that will leave you in splits.

Filled with Madras Tamil slang, the folks who grew up in Madras will enjoy it a tad bit more. The highlight of the film though is "evil" mechanic Son of Gun played with great aplomb by John Vijay. But even more sweeter is the fact that the film is directed by "our own" Pushkar and Gayatri with a panache that is missing from Tollywood.

Rating: * * +

Friday, January 04, 2008

Katha Parayumbol

Balan (Srinivasan) runs a small barber shop in a small town in Kerala. If you have ever had an hair cut in Kerala during the 80s you will identify with Balan's shop. A small rugged place with a few jobless hangers-on always in place. He struggles to make ends meet with this old style saloon. His hopes of scoring a loan to upgrade his shop are slowly sinking. It is in this scenario that his childhood friend Prakash Raj (Mammootty) arrives on the scene. Balan soon finds himself being the center of attraction. Everyone including his family trip over themselves in trying to get into his good books in hope of some face time with Prakash Raj. The consequences of these unwanted overtures puts Balan in hilarious scenarios.

What attracted me to the film was the fact that story, screenplay and dialogue were all by Srinivasan. He did not disappoint and nor did he satisfy my expectations as I could faintly hear the echo of an unacknowledged short story from yesteryear. The movie is a far cry from Chinthavishtayaya Shyamala and Vadakkunokkiyantram but yet worth a viewing.

Rating: * *