INDIAN IDOL - 2013 - REVIEW

Anjana Padmanabhan

The popular and successful first `Indian Idol Junior 2013' by Sony has come to an end with Anjana Padmanabhan from Mangalore winning pipping favorite Debanjana at the post.   Thought i felt Debanjana was more consistent, Anjana has picked up extremely well in the last 6-7 episodes and both the songs she chose and sung in the finals on last Saturday (Mujhe aajmane ki koshish na kar from `Loafar' and `ek pyaar ka nagma hai' from Shor) were simply outstanding.    Unlike  Andhra boy `Karunya' who despite being the outstanding singer on the block in Indian idol-2 cold not win because decision was based purely on the basis of public votes and Sony channel was not transmitted by local cable guys those days in AP and other South Indian states, the duel marking system of Judges awarding marks and voting by public and Sony now being available in all South Indian states through various dish companies might have worked in favour of Anjana.       

Debanja

After initial rounds they shortlisted 10 participants and then added Sughandha as wild card entry.    Though there is no dearth of talent among the aspirants who turned up atleast 3-4 (like Aryan, Akash and Sankalp) of the top 11 are no great shakes and one after the other they exited without putting up any real contest.     But for sure the top 6 did a great job and by their efforts the show picked up very well mid way through.

The youngest participant 8 years old Sughandha (who looked much younger to her age because of her tender frame) was given a very long rope and judges and voters might not have realized the fact that the age gap between her and Sonakshi, who was eliminated before her though more talented than her, was 10 (just 2 years older) so was Anjana.  In reality show after reality show such indiscreet voting pattern is observed. 

Other than the participating singers, it is the orchestra team who did a great job, specially the guitarist and two key board players.   For most of the songs they recreated the music very close to the original and their live orchestration lifted the spirits of the show.   The presenters are big letdown, Karan choosing to be funny and making fun of himself most of the time and the better covered up Mandira has right through been out of place.

Coming to judges, who are very important and play critical role, in most of the reality shows it appears that judges are given a role to play and from beginning to end they religiously follow that pattern.     All the judges of Indian Idol junior viz., Vishal, Shekar and Shreya are nice and sweet and it appears they are asked to remain so.    But as per me the role of judges in such reality shows, specially in case of junior championship should be that of a guide, mentor without being too critical or harsh with the participants.    But what I saw in this programme is right through all the judges have nothing but to say `repetitively how good the participants are,  the participants baffled them and they are ready for play back singing’.      But even for a layman’s ears like mine, many of the participants out of the top 10 and even top 5 were making some mistakes in their landing notes, in going to low pitches.   Honestly, even in the first finals on Saturday, I found the performance of Nivesh (in presenting Patthar ke sanam and Mein shayarat to nahi) and Anmol (in presenting Patta Patta Boota Boota) not upto the mark and judges did not point out any flaws.    It came as a great surprise that throughout the entire series none of the judges used headphones which helps them in catching technical glitches in singing.   Pointing out such finer technical points and guiding them how to overcome would have helped the younger participants rather than going overboard in praising the participating and many times patting their own backs in identifying such great talents and saying that they are truly blessed to be listening to such rare talent, which is extending kindness too much.   Amongst all the participants I found Debanajana, Anjana and Sonakshi rendering to be near to perfection.

SP Balasubramanyam, among other programmes in various languages, judges a Telugu singing talent show `PADUTA TEEYAGA’ in E-TV for the last 16 years.    Whether it was 16 years back when he was very busy with playback singing assignments in 5 languages or now when he is relatively free, he gave his 100%.   He keeps the lyrics of all the songs to be sung by the participants with him, most of the time uses head phone and while singing keep noting on the copy of the lyrics when and where the participants are flawing.   Immediately after the participants finish singing after giving encouraging and motivating remarks then he starts pointing out the flaws in singing – in pronouncing words, in singing styles, in mukhadas, antraas and landing notes – then he sings and shows how it is to be sung and then make the singer sing in proper style and ends by assuring that they have not done any crime and every one learns by committing mistakes only.    He adds lot of humour and gives lot of historical information about the song, music director, singers and what went in making the song.    

SP Balasubramanian

He never uses to words `winner’ and `loser’ in the programme, never allows anyone to cry or show any other emotions and never lead the participants in the garden path that they are ready for play-back singing,  instead he says it simply a singing competition and life does not come to an end if one doesn’t win it.    Many times he gives his own example that in his younger days in many singing competitions he stood 2^nd or even 3^rd and did his Engineering.   It is destiny that he became play back singers and went on to sing 40,000 songs and won national award in 3 langues.    That is the reason this vintage programme is most popular programme even after 16 years unbroken telecasting.  The audience not only looks forward for the singers singing but how SPB analysis and what tips he gives to the participants.     How I wish the various Hindi channels, specially Sony follow this pattern and brief their judges to do the role of mentors.    Unnecessary creation of hype and proving that the quality of participants and their programme is superior to others doesn’t serve any purpose and doesn’t help the young talent to hone their skills.

It is worth noting that in the 2nd Indian Idol Karunya was most favourite and ended up as runner up, 5th Indian Idol title was won by Sree Ram and both were from Andhra Pradesh and the First Indian Idol - Junior Anjana Pandmanabhan is from Karnataka but still Indian Idol auditions are not held in any of the South India states.     Hope Sony TV and other rival channels note this and hold auditions in South Indian states specially in AP and Karnataka.

S. Prabhakar

1.9.2013

UNRELIABLE CHICKEN-HEARTED MALE (BOY) FRIENDS

One common thing in the three unfortunate rape cases that have happened recently in three metro cities, Delhi (Nirbhay case), Bangalore (Infosys campus) and Mumbai (photo journalist case), was that in all the three cases the girls were with their male friends and in none of the three incidents it appears that the macho man have not done much to protect the young girl with whom they were moving.      Either they were tied or got a small bashing by which they kept quiet and it appears they did not do much to save the girl before the unfortunate incident or even after the ghastly act was over.      

  In the recent Mumbai incident it was reported that the victim and accompanying male were taken to the nearby railway station and put in a train.     Understandably the girl must have been great trauma and  was not in a position to re-group herself so soon but what made the male friend not to raise alarm at the station or enroute and get them arrested and grapple with atleast one or two and pin them down.   If I am not mistaken they were not in possession of knives or fire arms.    I am more than sure that if these girls were with their old and weak father or a brother they would have put a far higher degree of resistance to save the girl.

So my advice to all young girls, especially those going out late in the evening/night or to seclude places or parks or  abandoned monuments to  be conscious of the fact that the boy/male accompanying you is going to run away or comfortably get pinned down without much resistance and you need to fend yourself or become pray.    Whatever packs (4, 6 or 8) he must be flexing are cosmetic or steroid driven, neither he has the guts or macho-ness to put stiff resistance in a bit to save the girl.     It is only in the reel life that our hero bashes up 10 to 20 goons to save his heroin, but in the real life, unfortunately, it is a different ball game.   

It is unreasonable to expect the Police to be everywhere, considering our population and short staffed and ill equipped police force.  Added to this, police is used less for policing and more for security services for VIP and VVIPs and crowd control for various procession and Dharnaas which take place on a daily basis. But unfortunately they are used as the fall guys whenever such incidents happen.      If police try to be pro-active and shoo away young girls and boys from parks and seclude places they are blamed for doing morale policing.    Is it possible for the police to appear wherever and whenever you want them. 

Girls should also take stock of the very unsafe environment in which we

are living and spend some time, effort and money in learning self defense techniques.      No doubt it may be difficult to take on 5-6 guys at a time but in many rape cases in is only one or two persons who commit the crime and in such cases girls can definitely bash the guy (s) or atleast put great resistance and create lot of noise by which the attackers  may lose patience or get scared off  and run away or some help can come in by the commotion created.     Last week `Headline Today’ called in some experts (mostly girls) in one of the their special programmes and showed very simple techniques of how to combat such perpetrators.   They also exhibited some very sensitive zones in the body which can be targeted without using much force and if done so even able bodied men can also be disarmed easily.    Delhi Police organizes so many workshops on self defense techniques.       Young girls spend so much of time on FB, internet, gym (to be in good shape looks wise) and dance classes.    Why not spend some time for something which can save their honour and life.

S. Prabhakar

25.8.2013

Chennai express – as bad as a journey in an Indian Railways train)

(don’t worry if your Wait listed ticket doesn't get confirmed)

Rohit Shetty wanted to make a Hindi movie and ended making a Tamil Movie, without written subtitles What a fall for Rohit Sheetty from Goolmaal (2006) to Chennai Express (2013).    From the effortless rib tickling comedy Goolmall, with great repetitive value, to a laboured effort to make a ketch up comedy which is very ridiculous, if not offensive, to Tamilians/South Indians.    Rohit Shetty made very successful straight Hindi movies followed by remake of Tamil movie Singam and now seems to have confused whether to make a straight Hindi movie or a remake and ended up making a Tamil movie with Sharukh khan who mouths funny dialogues in Tamil and serious dialogues in Hindi and the villain gives a blank expression to both.

Nothing to write about the story (as a matter of fact none of Rohit Shetty movies ever had  any strong story line, and in this aspect Rohit Shetty has almost become Manmohan Desai of these times), but unlike other Rohit Shetty’s earlier movies neither comedy was good nor the action scenes.   Casting used to be the strong point in Rohit Sheety’s movies with so many stars being given a well defined role and even side kicks putting their best.  I still remember Sidharth doing a tiny comedy scene, may be at the most in 3-4 frames in Goolmall making unsuccessful attempt to kills Ajay devgan and his friends and generating such a humour.   He is now a regular in Comedy show in Sony for many years.   In Chennai express casting is disastrous staring from Sharukh who looks old and jaded (thankfully he was introduced as 40 yrs and Deepika pokes him to be 50), followed by one time small time Tamil hero and character actor Sathyaraj, who seems to be overawed by the presence of Sharukh and the fact that he is acting in a Hindi movie to such an extent that in the entire movie has one expression only.    I see atleast 100 South Indian movies a year (predominantly telugu movies) but never seen such ugly looking hunch man of a villain.   Considering that in every second movie the villain has atleast 20-30 hunch man (many of them now acquired celebrity status like Samba in Sholay), Rohit might have had far better choice and should kick his casting director in his back and throw him in the air as one of the many cars he does.      The only saving grace of the movie has been Deepika Padukone, who did a great job, which might have compelled the producer and director to give her top billing ahead of Shrakh himself and Nikitin Dheer as Tangabali, who has imposing personality.     Sharukh continues with his adulation with Rajni Sir and kept people guessing when Rajni Sir will make a grand entry for a small cameo like in Ra.one (since Sharukh gave a big thanks in the credits to him), but this time he only used his photos from Robo for end-credit song, which should thrill the average Tamil movie goer in TN.

The unpardonable thing in the movie is to try to create humour by the ridiculous way Hindi is spoken (haven’t the producer realized that there is a over-kill of it already).    I started learning Hindi when I was 17 years, but honestly I was never so bad or seen any one so horrible as Deepika has been depicted  saying `thi’ for a male (no doubt non-hindi speaking people have problem in making out when to use `tha’ and when `thi’ – like I still don’t now why it is `need lutha hai, chain looti hai’  in the famous Hindi song `Ek na ek din kahani banegi’ when both of things of third gender).    Banking on such silly things to generate humour is an exhibition of bankruptcy of ideas and writing skills.    Come to think of what our Censor Board and `Amma’ Jayalalita were doing for such things.     I recall that producer of `Aja Nachle’ was forced to drop `Mochi’ word from a song and producer of `Billu Barbar’ was forced to drop the word `Barbar’ from the title because a section of people took offence to it.    Some small fringe Muslim group made the life of Kamal Hassan miserable and our `Amma’ forcefully stopped the release of Vishwaroopam in TN.   But it appears that she has gone into slumber and not bothered about Tamil language and Tamilians being so ridiculed since no minority community is involved.     This year there was a Telugu movie `Denikaina Ready’ in which a Muslim boy impersonates as a Brahmin Pundit who conducts Homam/ Yagnas and the entire movie was nothing but ridiculing `dhoti wearing pandits’ and no amount of protests by Brahmin groups could make Government to act and the movie had a smooth sail.    Such things do not anger me but I feel pity that Religion, region, language are ridiculed to generate comedy and the worst part is that it is done in a crass manner.    How I wish these superstars have the ability or if not the ability but atleast the capability to imitate `late Mehmood’ whose comedy (including his hyderabadi dialect) used to be so enjoyable.   I can see his Padosan any number of times without being offended a wee bit for his brilliant portrayal of South Indian dance master, which still serves as a bench mark, to such an extent that Amitabh has imitated it in one of the Manmohan Desai Movies and had the humility to admit that he imitated his good old friend Mehmood.

  

Going by the popularity of Deepika and Sharukh and with 3500 prints being bombarding the theaters, the commercial success of the movie is assured and its entry into 100 crores club may be assured,  but it doesn’t take away the fact that it can be counted as one of the worst movies made by Rohit very close to Bol Bachan.     He should take a break and re-group himself to make straight Hindi movies or go back to his original roots (of Karnataka) and make South Indian movies (where mindless action movies sell) but for God’s sake do not make such movies as Chennai Express, which is not less ridiculous than Sharukh eating noodles with curd in Ra.one.     Sharukh should re-think about re-positioning himself, he cannot carry the `lover boy’ image anymore and he is just not cut out for action movies, he looks so off-colour in action scenes, more specially when he pits himself against a 6 footer like Dheer.  

S. Prabhakar

11.8.2013

SACHIN - REALISE THE TIME HAS COME TO SAY GOOD-BYE

Couple of days back In the morning Sachin cuts birthday cake, announces, age is no factor, thereby indicating that he will go on and on and let himself slipping down the ladder till he reaches the rock bottom, and in the evening after facing few deliveries gets knocked `neck and crop’ by Sunil Naraine in the process gets off balances falls in front on all his four – what a pathetic sight.      There was a time when bowlers used to keep the ball by which they used to discuss Sachin as souvenir, since it used to be such a hard task breaking through his defense and for the last one year or so, one need not wait for a long time between his coming to the crease and talking a long walk back giving the scorers a well deserved rest from moving the score board.      Hardly anyone can remember when he survived more than 20 balls in an IPL match.   

It happens in the life of many celebrities that they just cannot leave the ark light and retire gracefully and keep making `ass of themselves’.    We have seen Mike Tyson participating in many exhibition matches and keep getting trashed and earning millions of dollar in the process, but falling from the grace of one time knocking out opponents in couple of minutes ever before audience could properly settle down in their seat.      Rajesh Khanna acted in many insignificant Z grade movies for many years and made mockery of him in many award functions craving for and demanding recognition.   

   

Even for an ardent fan of Sachin, my memory of his smash bulking innings and sending shivers down the spine of bowler like MaC Graft and Shane Warne is getting eclipsed by such below par performance and ridiculously easy dismissals.   Sachin, now that Birthday parties have settled down, wake up, mature and bow out graceful.

S. Prabhakar

26.4.13

MY FAVOURITE FIVE


 BEN-HUR – English
(William Wyler)

Ben Hur the 1959 epic masterpiece historical drama was set in ancient Rome stars Charlton Heston in the title role of a rebellious Israelite Jew who takes on the Roman Empire during the time of Christ.   

With largest sets ever built for a movie, the film was the most expensive ever made at that time. The movies contains the most famous and breathe taking action sequence of all times, the nine minutes chariot race which could not ever be recreated and has no match even in this digital age.       Apart from this the forts under construction, the battle ships, their rowing and ultimately destruction all were picturised in a grand manner.   

It won a record breaking 11 Oscars, including Best Picture, Director, Actor, Supporting Actor, Cinematography, art direction, special effects, which record it held upto 38 years when it was equaled by Titanic in 1997.    Even after six decades, one could enjoy this movie and awe struck by the magnitude and grandeur of the movie

MUGHAL-E-AZAM – Hindi
(K. Asif)

Mughal-e-Azam, the all the time super hit epic, directed by K. Asif, which was in the making for decades and ran into huge financial crisis while under production, was ultimately released 1960.   It featured Prithviraj Kapoor as Akbar, Dilip Kumar as Salim and Madhubala as Anarkali,  all of whom put up their best act together to make it memorable and all time great Hindi/Indian movie.     The confrontation scenes and dialogues between Prithviraj and Dilip Kumar were a treat to watch and cassettes and CD of the dialogues are still in great demand.   The story revolves around the love of Salim for Anarkali, which is disapproved by Akbar leading to the war of words and actual war.      No effort was spared in making this masterpiece and despite mounting budget, to such an extent that the sets built for the famous song sequence ‘Pyaar kiya to darna kya’ has costed as much as making a movie at that time.    

But the labour of love has not disappointed the producer and director, as the movie broke all records and was the highest grosser for many years to come and ranks in top 10 Hindi/Indian movies of any person.  

  

DAANA VEERA SOORA KARNA – Telugu

(N.T. Rama Rao)

DVS Karna, the 1977 Telugu mythological movie was produced, directed and acted by the legendary Nandamuri Taraka Rama Rao (NTR).    Taking few episodes from Mahabharat, this story of DVS karna was woven which was an experimental effort of NTR to depict the character of Durvodhan in a non-negative manner.       It was first and probably the only movie in which Duryodhan was shown as intelligent, logical, shrewd, good strategist, administrator and Ruler.     In the confrontations with Krishna, he logically explains why he doesn’t want to give any land to Pandavas and justifies all his acts and deeds.   Many felt that the movie should have been named after Duryodhan rather than Karna.    

NTR, the multi talented legendary star of Telugu film industry, who mastered in essaying mythological characters, has made a great experiment and took great risk of essaying three different mythological roles of Krishn, Karn and Duryovhan in this movie and it is a tribute to his talent that he has pulled off brilliant performance specially in the role of Durvodhan.    The Dialogue penned by Kodaveeti Venkatakavi have been delivered by NTR in his typical `pure chaste Telugu (gradhikam) style which floored one and all and till date remain as bench mark.    For the first time dialogues of a Telugu movie were released in audio cassettes and till date they are in great demand.   Besides the three roles he produced and directed the movie as well.    

With a running time of 4 hours and 17 minutes it is the longest Indian movie and out of this NTR is there for 4 hours length of the movie which too is a world record and to hold the interest and attention of audience for such long time is no less an achievement

Though made at a shoe string budget of Rs. 10 lakhs in record 43 days to beat Krishna who making Kurukhestra with almost similar theme, it was a massive commercial hit collecting Rs, 2 cores.   It remains a jewel in the crowded crown of NTR.

SHOLAY – Hindi

(Ramesh Sippy)

Sholay – the 1975 all time record breaking blockbuster was produced by GP Sippy and Directed by his son Ramesh Sippy.   The  simple story of retired police officer hiring two petty thieves to catch the dreaded dacoit Gabbar Singh has heavily barrowed from many western movies and Hindi movie `Mera Gaon Mera Desh’.      But the biggest congregation of stars, well defined roles to each and every character, best performances put in by all actors, whatever may be the length of their characters, highest production values, never seen technical fineness, elaborately mounted action scenes with the help of Hollywood technicians, great music by RD Burman all worked in making it as biggest blockbuster of all times.     

It was the first Indiann film presented in 70 mm and six track stereophonic soundtracks.    The Hollywood technicians engaged did a great job in mounting action scenes in a grand scale specially the train chase scene which could not be re-created till date even by movie with bigger budgets.    

Though there were so many stories of various alternative stars considered for various characters including Danny for Gabbar Singh, the stars ultimately selected suited the roles to the T, specially Amjad Khan as Gabbar Singh.

Sholay broke all records with Golden Jubilees in 60 centers, Silver Jubilee in 100 centers and an unbelievable 5 years run in a Mumbai Theater.   By many counts, Sholay still remains as the most successful movie of all times in India

ENTER THE DRAGON – English

(Robert Clouse)

Enter the Dragon, 1973, Bruce Lee starrer directed by Robert Clouse, is Hong Kong martial arts action film produced by Hollywood’s Warner Brothers in association with Golden Harvest (which later made many martial art movies with Jakie Chan)

Enter the Dragon is probably the first Hollywood movie, which is purely based on martial arts, which catapulted Bruce Lee to a cult figure, but alas he died a week before the release of the movie and could not live to see what a blazing trial he left behind.  

   

The never-before-seen elaborately mounted action scenes using slow motion and Chinese martial arts and the immortalization by legendary Brucee Lee have been lapped up by audience all over the world and not only Enter the Dragon was a huge success all over the world but also made the way to hundreds of Chinese/Hong kong/Hollywood martial arts movies to follow even till date.     Jakie Chan, who was one of the stuntmen who worked in this movie, went on to become another cult figure after Burce Lee in martial arts action movies

A movie which tops the list of action movies of any person, is still popular with Seattleite channels, which show this movie very often.

Those that almost made

• Gone with the Wind – Victor Fleming
• Guns of Navarone – J. Lee Thomson, Alexander Mackndrick
• Gundamma katha – Telugu – Kamalakara Kameswara Rao
• Pushpak – Silent movie – Singeetam Srinivasa Rao
• Mera Naam Jokar – Raj kapoor

S. PRABHAKAR

JAKIE CHAN - 
THE MARVELOUS MARTIAL ARTS STAR  AND AN INCREDIBLE ENTERTAINER

Today I saw the latest Jackie Chan action flick `CZ12’  which is a released after a long gap from his earlier movie.  It was widely reported and publicized as the last major action movie of Jackie Chan as he has decided to hang his boots and take care of body, which has been subject to torturous stunts for a very long time.   The type of action scenes he conceives and executes on his own without using doubles, with such agility even at the age of 58 years is absolutely amazing.     Undoubtedly though at this ripe age for action movies, he has slowed down compared to the high standards he set which we all are used, but still he is far better than any our bollywood/tollywood/kollywood action stars almost half of his age.     Thankfully he has not lost even a bit of his comic touch and timing and keep creating funny situations even in action scenes which is unique to Jackie Chan only. 

CZ12 which was tipped as Armour of God Part III is not a patch on Armour of God I or II.    Both the earlier versions specially Armour of God II (Operation Condor) was a roller coaster ride with lavishly mounted and death defying stunts and chasing scenes with rip roaring comedy (including the climax scenes) sprinkled in.    There were hardly any significant action scenes except the opening action sequence using a unique skates.    All of a sudden post interval he realized that the movie doesn’t have enough action scenes and from there it picks up and the last 40 minutes has some interesting Jackie Chan trade mark stuns.    Age definitely is showing on his face and moments and good that he took a decision to bow out from out and out action movies.  

Jackie Chan started his career as a child artist at the age of 8 years and in the initial part of his life he worked as a stunt-man in many listless Chinese kungfu movies.   He had `you-blink-you-miss’ half a minute role in Bruce Lee’s Fist of Fury and Enter the Dragon.    It is because of a posting with caption `Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan stunt scene’ in the youtube that one could make out that one of the 50 odd guys who jump on Bruce Lee and get thrashed in the villain’s den in the Enter the Dragon was Jackie Chan.     The untimely death of Bruce Lee has thrown the arena wide open to countless number of Bruce Lee clown with martial arts movies getting released in dozens in late 1970s and 1980s.   But most of the martial art stars could not last beyond few movies.   

Around the same time Jackie Chan too was peeking with Chinese/Hong kong action movies which were poor in their production values but high on skillfully mounted stunts.    I took notice of Jackie Chan, out of many action stars of 1980s, for the first time in very popular movie `Young Master’ which was a run away hit in India, followed by Rumble in the Bronx.    Then came the very successful franchise of Police Story series (under which 5 movies were made) and by that time Jackie Chan has established himself as undisputed action star in Asian countries and I became a die hard fan of Jackie Chan.   

What made Jackie Chan to extend his career without getting saturated is the uniqueness of staging of the very long drawn action scenes, almost using everything around, (chairs, tables, sofas, fridge, carpets, dishes in the kitchen – and the list goes on)  as a weapon and the unbelievable flexibility, agility – jumping, dropping, rolling, sliding from unconceivable heights.   Another secret of his longevity is his impeachable comic timing and his ability to create humour while executing toughest stunts which helped him to develop a huge base of children as his fans.     Jackie Chan was smart enough to realize that children form a big fan base, he consciously ensured that his movie, though out and out action movies, will not have blood spitting gory scenes or sex.  

Having been stuntman himself in his early days, he and his stunt team (with which he worked for over 25 years) created some of the most interesting and elaborate stunt scenes, which could not be matched even by Hollywood movies which are made at much bigger project cost,  and his doing all his stunts himself has lent lot of credibility.     The high voltage stunts of Youngmaster, Police Story 1 and 2, Dragon Forever, Armor of God 1 and 2, Who am I, Project-A stand out.   


Having established himself as undisputed action-king, he set his eyes in Hollywood.    Though he could not succeed much in his earlier attempts, he stormed Hollywood by pairing with Chris Tucker in Rush Hour followed by Rush House-2 and 3 all of which were huge hits.      This established him as the most popular and highest paid Asian star.    He also featured in Shangai series with moderate success.   After dabbling with Hollywood movies for some time, he fell back upon his roots and started concentrating on his HongKong based movies.     Right from Star Movie to Movie Now, HBO, WB, Sony Pix you name any English movie channel  they all started with a series of action movie and more than 80% of them were Jackie Chan, which is a true reflection of his universal popularity 

Besides me, everyone in my family, specially my second daughter,  are die-hard fans of Jackie Chan, and we never miss an opportunity to see a Jackie Chan on TV/theater any number of times.   I might have seen his movies like Project-A, Police Story, Armour of God, Medallion, Rush Hour, Who Am I, atleast 20 to 25 times without suffering `diminishing marginal utility’.      He, like Kamal Hassan, are my very long standing favourites and I hardly find them putting a foot wrong and always look forward for their movies and never missed any of their movies.  

Though Jackie Chan has decided to go slow on his stunts, we can still expect him to entertain us he has more to offer than his stunts being a producer, director, screenplay writer, action choreographer and singer.   Thanks Jackie Chan for entertaining millions fans like us for such long time, I will always enjoy repeat viewing of all your stunning action movies.  

S. Prabhakar

5.1.2013

DABANGG - 2 - banking too much on formula

I took my daughter Pallavi to Dabang-2, the sequel to Dabang, (though she doesn’t like Salman Khan) as welcome party to Delhi for a month break.  

I too did not expect much from Dabang-2, except a time pass mass masala movie, but it failed to be the same too.     May be because of change of Director to Arbaaz Khan, it lost its sharp and sleekness as the first in the franchise, though to be reasonable to AK, he didn’t do all that bad job.

All the characters of Chulbul pandey’s family have been carried forward, united and close-knit this time (Dimple Kapaida photo hanging on the wall).   The stage was shifted to Kanpur and the hunch man changing to the vastly (but hugely wasted) talent Prakash Raj.      First of all the menace of crime has not been properly built up except one kidnap incident to enable Chulbul pandey to make a typical grand entry which is no different from any of his movies from Wanted.  

Dabang-2 suffers hugely due to lack of storyline, it has too many action-scenes and songs (with as many as 3 item numbers) in the small 2:10 hours movies.   The saving grace being the light hearted comedy specially by the sidekicks of Chulbul pandey  viz., chobeji, sharmaji and importantly the Commissioner – the guy who acts in Yatra.com advt with Salmaan and Vinod Khanna (probably for the first time in his career).   

Salmaan, looks-wise looks smashing, slim, trim and not looking like uncle of Sonakshi who must be more than 20 years younger to him (like the way Sharukh was looking in JBHJ) and conveniently banked heavily on the Dabang brand and the purple patch which he is enjoying for the last 3-4 years.      But alas, the same cannot be said about his mobility, which is looking crippled for quite some time.    Whether it is lavishly mounted action-scenes or gyrating with item-numbers the maximum movement is restricted                    max to a radius of 3-4 feet – that shows that our heros just stand and pump in muscles rather than doing cross-country to improve mobility.    In dialogue delivery he fell back on his time tested Big Boss/Dus ka dum style.      But one need to give it to him that he still commands huge fan base with all the theaters (some good 300 plus shows per day in Delhi) completely sold out.      Sonakshi, who resemble Hema Malini in many angles, need to be appreciated for looking sober and graceful in saris and long hand blouses, in these days where heroins are giving vamps a run for their money in their dress sense or otherwise.

Prakash Raj, for whom I went to see the movie to monitor his progress in Hindi movies, has been a disappointment, not because of lack of efforts from his side, but because his character has not been properly developed and given the power punch dialogues, like in Singham, in which he excels.     Moreover I could not really make out whether he dubbed himself (which he normally does in all languages including in Hindi) or changed his modeling to suit a UP based character (though no specific dialect was used) which taken sheen of his dialogue delivery.     He just sleep walked through the character, such role having been done by him hundreds of times in Telugu and Tamil movies.     I wish he chooses his roles carefully in Hindi (though you cannot blame him for not resisting the temptation of working in Salmaan’s home production).    Having seen hundreds of his Telugu movies where he assayed wide variety of roles, I have no doubt in my mind that he has all the potential to become the next big thing in essaying villan and charcter actor roles and steps into the large shoes of Pran and Amrish Puri.     

The cable supported action-scenes are becoming very stereo-typed and getting on nerves.  For me who has seen all the top Telugu/Tamil stars doing it for the last 8 years or so which later on imported in the Hindi movies from `Wanted’ onwards  and religiously followed by all stars (who all of a sudden want to become action-stars).   The good news is that off-late the action-scenes of some of the second rung  stars of Telugu/Tamil movies are showing some change and hope it will prevail.    We have enough of stunt man flying all over, breaking all and sundry and their bones in the bargain (and our mecho hero just waving his hand) and their bouncing back when banged on floor like a spring ball.   

The strange phenomena I observed in Delhi was that whereas the Hindi producers are jostling with each other to remake top South Indian block-buster, the viewers too are going the South Indian audience way, with deafening clapping and whistling right through the movie, the opening shots of Salmaan, items numbers and for all songs.     

You will not miss anything if you give a `miss’ to Dabang-2, but if you cannot resist the temptation to go to a masala-sprinkled movie go and get head-ache the way I got.  

S. Prabhakar

23.12.2012