Review of Bengali Film Buno Haansh

Almost seven years ago a new director came to Bengali movie industry who had a fresh vision to make films and with refreshing approach of storytelling he easily connected himself with his target audiences. He was Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury and the movie was "Anuranan". later in last 7 years he made two more movies "Antaheen" and "Aparajita Tumi". With these three films he has made a convention about him that he is a filmmaker who can make movies based on love and longing of urban people and it appeal to a particular section of audiences, but with his latest venture "Buno Haansh" he has jumped into a totally new world. The world of lower middle class people of Kolkata, their need , their poverty, their greed. In this world there is love , but love may have to take a backseat for the struggle of survival.

The story is based on the novel written by Samaresh Majumdar with the same name. Like every other novel adaptation here too the filmmaker has taken lots of creative liberties and has made some changes to fit it as a screenplay of a running time of around 140 minutes. The basic story is very much cliche where a good hearted poor guy Amal (Dev) gets into world of crime(smuggling here) just to make more money to satisfy the basic needs of him and the people around him. As he proceeded more in this world he found himself totally trapped in the dangerous world from where its almost impossible to return to his normal life.  

Although the story has nothing new to offer still it will keep the audiences interest intact because of the screenplay which has lots of twist and turns and the interesting characters who are very much realistic. The way the screenplay has been written that you will feel yourself involved with the journey of Amal. For example the scene where he is travelling to abroad for the first time you can feel his nervousness, or the major twist before interval will make you worried that what will happen to Amal now. The climax is also very much thrilling but it has an open ending which may or may not appeal to the audiences. 

As a director Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury has taken a new challenge to tell a story which is

totally out of his own comfort zone and he has succeeded in it with full marks. It is his skills which has made it not just a crime thriller rather it has a strong element of human emotions like love, passion, greed , betrayal, fear and survival against all odds. Only his loyal fans can miss romance a bit. There is a soft romanctic track between Amal and his friend Sohag but it is just a subplot here. As a director Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury's  perfection for detailing is visible in almost every frame from choosing perfect locations to the every detail of his each character like their costumes , their make up , their body language and dialogues.He has tried to increase the commercial appeal which is not bad but just like the lead character of the story Amal, he has also not sold his soul just to make more money and easy money. For example there was a good enough situation (and not so good enough item girl Raima Sen) for an item song in a dance bar which could have increase the movies commercial appeal but the director has restricted this greed and has given it a real touch by using a late 90's Hindi Item song that too for few seconds in middle of conversations.

Last year with "Chander Pahar" ,commercial film's superstar Dev had made his entry to world of parallel cinema or meaningful cinema. It was a good attempt on his behalf and he had got a mixed response for it. But with "Buno Haansh" he has come a long way, his acting has matured a lot here. Still it can be said that he is not the best actor available in Bengali cinema today to portray this character. But it can be definitely said that he is the best choice for this role among the actors who can pull the audiences to the theaters and bring back producer's money. The subject of the movie has a larger appeal and provided a commercial star it can earn a good money too. In that point of view Dev was the only choice for this role. His face has an inherent innocence which has worked for the character of Amal. Also it is showing that the acting workshop he has done before the shooting has worked a lot. His body language, his dialogue delivery has improved a lot. While watching the film you will never thought he is super star of loud South Indian remakes rather he is looking every bit of Amal a innocent guy who wants to cherish his dreams and for that he can choose wrong way too but by heart he has never changed.

It is true that the main focus is on the character of Amal, but there is a bunch of supporting characters who are there with Amal in his journey. And the credit must be given to the casting director for choosing appropriate actors for the supporting roles. 

Tanushree has done some non commercial movies earlier too but probably it is the movie which has given her the opportunity to act in a bigger and more meaningful role. Her character Rijula is very mysterious , sometimes it looks positive on next moment it has some grey shades. She has played the modern day woman who can proudly confess that she can go to any extent to make money for a better life. Tanushree has looked confident in this complex character. She will surely get noticed for her performance.

On the contrary to the character of Rijula there is the character of Sohag, played by Shrabanti. Sohag is the friend of Amal who secretly loves him too but do not want to express it as she is struggling to survive from a deadly disease. She is not demanding about money or a better life rather she only needs the company of Amal for the rest of her life. In this role Shrabanti has looked very good. In a non make up look she has looked similar to her character in "Gaynar Baksho" but the similarity is only in the appearance, here her acting has improved more. Though the screen time of her character is less but still she manages to leave an impact. Her chemistry looked good with Dev, specially in the song "Esechhe Raat".

Other two ladies who are just awesome are Sohag Sen and Sudipta Chakraborty.Sohan Sen has played the character of Amal's mother. Her performance is very much realistic and she has underplayed the character with absolute perfection. She has never made the character as a cliche mother's character like a nagging mother or a teary eyed mother. Rather her performance is controlled and restrained. In the climax scene where she is talking with Amal over phone, her restlessness, her tension can be easily felt in her voice , in her expressions even without a single drop of tear in her eyes.

On the other hand Sudipta Chakraborty will surely grab everyone's attention as Manju , sister in law of Amal. She has once again proved her acting caliber and also proved that how the filmmakers are yet to utilize her talent giving roles as per her capacity. She has very few scenes but she has managed to surprise the viewers with her power-packed performance. She has looked so real as a housewife of a middle class family.

Gargi Roy Chowdhury is a also impressive as the sex racket owner Adrijaa. Moon Moon Sen is not convincing enough in the role of the underworld head Madam , but being an irregular face to recent Bengali films she has brought a  freshness to the character.

Not only the women, the male actors has also provided solid support in the supporting roles.

Anindya Banerjee is effective as Robin who brings Amal to the world of crime. Shankar Chakraborty has also done a different character from his regular image as Badshah Bhai an agent of the smuggling business. Arindam Shil has his moments as Haque another agent in smuggling business. Shantilal Mukherjee is superb as a local goon who works for Haque. 

Without the brilliance of the technical team  perhaps it would not be easy to adapt the novel

to a movie. The credit should go to the production designer Kaushik Das and Subrata Barik for choosing such realistic locations and creating such authentic sets in different geographical locations from  Kolkata to Dhaka to Bangkok to Pune and Mumbai. All these different locations has been captured superbly by the cinematographer Harendra Singh. He has shoot the underbelly of Kolkata to the fast moving life of Bangkok with an authentic feel. It is his camera's magic that the locations has also acted as characters. The sound design by National award winner Biswadeep Chatterjee is wonderful. You can feel the different sounds of different geographical locations. The editing

has been done by the extremely talented Arghya Kamal Mitra and he has succeeded again to make it sharp. The only thing which was not required was the over use of the different footage of Dhaka and Bangkok city to establish the change of location. Although the Bengali audiences would never mind to see the visuals of Dhaka as everyone's has some connection to other side of Bengal.Thankfully he has not used any single montage of Mumbai City as we have seen it too many times in different movies. The dialogues are also very effective and suits the different social and geographical position of characters from Bangal to normal Bengali to Hindi. The same can be said about the make up and costumes department who has designed the realistic look for every character according their social and geographical background.

The another highlight of the movie is the soulful music by Shantanu Moitra. The successful Musical team of director Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury Music Composer Shantanu Moitra and Lyricist Chandril & Anindya(From Chandrabindoo) are back once again with some really melodious tracks. This time the team has a new entry in the form of lyricist Srijato who has penned very meaningful lyrics. All the songs are good but the best one is of course "Zindagi Kabhi Bhi Thamti Nahi". This song has been used as a theme song throughout the film and it has summarized the story very well. Apart from that the other songs which have been used very well in the movie are "Hariye Theekana Khonje Ghar", "Eseschhe Raat" and "Bela Boye Jay".

The loyal fans of Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury can think it is not his type of movie which can touch the hearts but it is not true. It is more fast paced and have some blood gun and violence but the signature style of the filmmaker is still there. Still the focus is on the characters and they are from the real world so they will obviously connect with viewers. The director has not compromised his creativity for the sake of commercialization. At the same time Dev's loyal fans will also not be disappointed at all as the story is gripping and the performance by Dev is also superb. This time he has rocked even without dancing in foreign locations and delivering punchlines. So there is something for every cine-goer in this movie, so give it a chance and you will definitely like it.

Highlights of Bengali Movies in the first half of 2014

As we are already in the third quarter of the year 2014 it is the best time to look back and see how was the journey of Bengali movies in the first half of 2014. Like always this year too we have seen hardcore commercial movies which are mostly the remake of South Indian films continued to rule the box office specially at the small centers. At the same time some non commercial meaningful cinemas also have been made which continued to rule the heart of the urban audiences and sometime the box office too.

Lets do a monthly basis analysis:

January

Jaatishwar

This was the first movie which Srijit Mukherjee had directed outside Venkatesh Films. As a result the marketing was little low in comparison to Srijit's earlier movies so its opening was not that huge at the box office. but its collection grows later with the word of mouth publicity.After watching the film people realizes that this is Srijit Mukherjee's best film till date. The performances by Prosenjeet Chatterjee and Jishu Sengupta was superb. Also there was a brilliant supporting cast. Another highlight of the film was the soulful music by Kabir Suman. Later the film got 4 national awards too which also worked in favor of the film. 
Apart from the actors on screen this movie had a super talented team behind the camera too including Director Srijit Mukherjee, Cinematographer Soumik Halder, Make up artiste Vikram Gaikwad etc.

Bangali Babu English Mem

This year this was the first commercial potbolier from Venkatesh Film production house. It was a remake of Punjabi superhit film "Jatt & Juliet" and probably it was the first Bengali remake of a Punjabi film. This film was not a big commercial hit neither was a winner for the critics. The only highlight of the film was the perfectly timed chemistry between the lead pair Soham and Mimi Chakraborty. Also Bishwajeet and Laboni Sarkar had done a good supporting role. The music of the film was also successful.


The Royal Bengal Tiger
With this movie Bollywood director Neeraj Pandey made his debut as Bengali film producer. It was also co-produced by superstar Jeet. But he was not the leading

man here rather he had acted in a supporting role only. The leading man was Abir Chatterjee, probably Jeet took this decision because the unconventional characterization of the main hero of the film would not suit with his on screen image. This was really a different subject for Bengali movies which deal about schizophrenia. But its not necessary that everything which is different will be welcomed. The audiences did not give a good response to the film and it bombed badly at the box office. But it have to be said that this was Abir Chatterjee's one of the best performances on screen. Very rarely he gets the chance to portray such character. Jeet was also good in something different. Another good thing about the movie was Shradhha Dasm who is a Bengali but normally does south indian films. She made her debut in Bengali films with this one. She did a good job and showed that now there is a good alternate option for the same Raima Sen for the non-commercial films.

February

Chhaya Manush

It was a good attempt to make an unconventional super natural thriller but unfortunately it was not engaging enough to make its way to the audiences heart. Although it had four talented actors like Parambrata Chatterjee, Paoli Dam, Raima Sen and Kaushik Ganguly but most of them were wasted. The only actor who shine here was Kaushik Ganguly. He had played the negative role brilliantly. Also the beautiful locations of Darjeeling was captured very well by cinematographer Shirsha Ray.





Obhishapto Nighty

On the occasion of Valentines Day ,Venkatesh films presented a sex comedy which had some supernatural element too in the form of a nighty, a cursed nighty. Just like the name of the film the subject was also funny. The mix of horror and comedy was obviously inspired by the success of "Bhooter Bhabisyat" but the comedy here was not of that standard. Director Birsa Dasgupta had tried to attempt a new thing for Bengali films which was sex comedy but the main problem with the film's script was that it was not consistent , there were lots sub tracks involving lots of characters as a result after good first half the film lost its focus and got confused. Still the film was enjoyable in parts because of some superb comic acting by Mir, Sumit Samaddar,Locket Chatterjee, Laboni Sarkar, Supriyo Dutta and Paran Bandopadhyay. There is rarely any opportunity for good music in a sex comedy but still the songs composed by Indradeep Dashgupta were wonderful.

Jodi Love Dile Na Prane

It was last release of February starring the fresh pair of two talented actors Abir Chatterjee and Ananya Chatterjee. This movie was directed by Abhijit Guha and Sudeshna Roy. It was an unconventional love story which did not work much at the box office but the performances of the lead cast was appreciated very much.Also Neel Mukherjee and Gaurav Chakraborty were good enough in supporting cast. Once again it was proved that Abir Chatterjee can not deliver a box office hit as a leading man.


 March

In March There was not a single release which make any mark in the audiences heart or at the box office.

April

Chirodini Tumi Je Amar 2

This Venkatesh films production was directed by Soumik Chatterjee. It was a tragic love story featuring a group of talented new comers.The story had an emotional connect with the audiences and it was executed very well by the actors like Arjun Chakraborty, Urmila Mahanto, Bihu Mukherjee, Riddhi Sen and Ena Saha. As a result it became successful at the box office and made a good enough money considering it was a film of new comers. The soulful music by jeet Ganguly was a add on.

Take One

With this film Mainak Bhaumik came with yet another bold subject with his favorite Swastika Mukherjee as the lead. This movie was loosely based on the real life story of the lead actress Swastika Mukherjee. She played an alcoholic actress with broken relationships. Also her real life daughter Anwesha  made her debut as her on screen daughter. Both mom and daughter did a powerful acting. But another highlight of the film was the nude scenes of Swastika Mukherjee whic creates a lot of controversies at the same time made it a big hit at the small centers too.

Apur Panchali

Master storyteller Kaushik Ganguly came with yet another unconventional story. The story was about the life of Subir Banerjee,the child actor of "Paather Panchali". The screenplay was very good and it blended the story of the reel and real life of Apu very well. There were some fantastic acting by Parambrata Chatterjee, Ardhendu Banerjee, Parno Mitra and Gaurav Chakraborty. The music by Indradip  Dasgupta was also a big hit. The cinematography was also very nice which gave an authentic feel.The film got lots of appreciation from critics and at festivals as well as it got good response at the box office too.



May

Window Connection

This movie did not get too much pre release hype as it was not made by any big production house. But after watching this psychological thriller people loved it. The performances of Aryann Bhowmick and Tanushree was also loved by the audiences.


Ami Sudhu Chheyechhi Tomay

This was the first and only production from Eskay movies this year.This Eskay films production has Ankush and Subhashree as the leading pair. It was obviously a south Indian remake with lots of masala elements put together. This.This romantic movie got a good response at the box office. The superhit music, specially the melodious title track was also responsible for its success.







Bari Tar Bangla

There was too much hype with this Rangan Chakraborty directed film, mostly because of the leading man Saswata Chatterjee. But after watching the film people disappointed very much as the script was a bunch of comic jingles put together. Overall the story was very weak but the comic dialogues and brilliant performance by Saswata Chatterjee and Sumit Samaddar was the highlight of the film. The film got a good opening at the box office but later its collections dropped. Still it managed a good collection because of the strong opening week.

Arundhati

It was a big budget south Indian remake from Venkatesh films and Surinder films. There was too much hype before its release because of the powerful special effects , the large scale production values, superb on screen characterization of Koyel Mallick and Indrneil Sengupta. But when people watched the film they realized the main thing was missing, a strong story which can connect with the audiences. Though the visual effects were really good also the leading cast has done a superb job ,but due to big budget of the film it flopped very badly in spite of a good opening.


Game

This Jeet starer remake of South Indian superhit "Thupakki" was  a game changer at the box office. The successful team of "Boss" came back with this film and it got good advantage for their last success. It got a huge opening and later also its collection continued for some week.The performance by Jeet was appreciated very much.the Jeet Subhashree chemistry was also clicked once again. The music by Jeet Ganguly was a hit. Though it did not become as much successful as "Boss" but still it did well at box office.





June

Ramdhanu

Director duo Shiboprosad and Nandita came with yet another movie based on the story of Suchitra Bhattacharya. This time it was a story about the problems parents have to face to admit their kids in a reputed school. Just like their earlier films this time also it had no big stars rather the story was the main hero. the story had a good mix of comedy and emotion which worked very well with the audiences. The acting by Shiboprasad Mukherjee and Gargi Roychoudhury was brilliant. This movie take a slow start at the box office but finally wins the race by winning audiences as well as critics's hearts.

Chaar

If its a Sandip Ray film people are always waiting for something good. This time Sandip Ray made a collection of four short films based on four short stories by some famous authors. Not all the stories were good in similar way. Each one has its strength and weakness but the first story featuring Paran Bandopadhyay , Saswata Chatterjee and Shreelekha Mitra was the best one. The movie did not have a good fate at box office, but the performances by some of the cast members were very good. The only thing could have been said when Sandip Ray had to choose only four stories he could have been more selective.


Bonku Babu

This was yet another movie which proved now a days Saswata Chatterjee agrees to do any film without thinking much about the story provided he is getting the lead role. Here too he played the lead role of a 60 year old person who was the head of a joint family. This comedy was just an average attempt to make people laugh. The only highlight was the make up of Saswata Chatterjee which was done to make him look like an old man. Though after watching the film it was tough to understand why the makers offered a middle aged person to play an old man's role where the role could have been done by any old actor too. Maybe they wanted to en-cash the popularity of Saswata Chatterjee and they succeeded in that to some extent.


Over all it can be said there were very few big blockbusters in terms of box office collections. Hope the second half will bring good luck for Bengali movies.

Review of Kick

From last 3-4 years a new brand of cinema has been introduced that is called brand Salman Khan movies. The main features of this type of cinemas are this movies are  remake of a successful south Indian film, there will be high voltage action sequences, there will  be chartbuster songs, the story will not follow any kind of logic, there will be enough punchlines which will generate seetis and tallis, most of them will release on the festive season of Eid, most of them will be produced by any friend or relative of Salman Khan, and above all Salman Khan will be the biggest USP of these films  and in almost every scene there will be an attempt to utilize the popularity of brand Salman Khan. "Kick" belongs to the same category of movies but still it can appeal to the non-Salman fans too because of the presence of two brilliant actors Randeep Hooda and Nawazuddin Siddiqui.

Before the release of the film lots of things had been said about the story of the film that it is inspired by Salman's real life but in reality the only similarity is just like real life in the movie

too Salman is attached with a charity fund apart from that there is no similarity.This is the story of Devi Lal Singh who is genius who can multitask on lots of complicated works together, who had lots of educational degrees but can not work on a single job because he does not get the kick in that. One fine day he meets Shaina( Jacqueline Fernandez) who is a psychiatrist and falls in love with her but soon they realizes that their preferences in life are different so they broke up. Then all of a sudden Devi Lal Singh becomes a super cool thief Devil who robs money from rich to serve the poor and he found his much awaited kick in this job. From this point starts the main story which is the cat and mouse chase between a super cool thief Devil and a street smart cop Himanshu Tyagi (Randeep Hooda). This thief and cop encounter has so much similarity with Dhoom series movies that you may think that you are actually watching Dhoom 4. Just like the Dhoom movies here too the thief and cop comes face to face so many times but the cop is unaware of the identity of the thief, here too the thief throws open challenges to the cop before doing his robberies and here too there is an emotional cause attached with the thief as a result the cop develops sympathy for the thief towards the climax. But the difference is the cop Himanshu Tyagi (Randeep Hooda) is much more intelligent and smart than Jay Dixit of Dhoom series and this works for the benefit of the movie.

Four persons name have been credited as the screenplay writer probably they have written different episodes of the film as the movie is clearly divided in four episodes. First one about

Devi and Shaina's love story, second one about Devil and Himanshu's clash, third one featuring the main villain Shiv Gajra (Nawazuddin Siddiqui) in Poland and the final one about the revelation of Devils secret and the final clash between Devil and Himanshu. Among them the first episode is the worst one as the love story processed in a very slow pace and there is not enough engaging moments too. The third section is the best probably because of the entry of the brilliant Nawazuddin Siddiqui as Shiv Gajra. The screenplay is inconsistent but there are lots of moments for Salman fans. There are some scenes which will definitely deserve claps from audiences like: when Devi goes to meet Shaina's father Brijesh Mehra (Saurabh Shukla); when Devil crosses a railway track in front of a super fast train; the scene just before the interval where Devi alias Devil comes back to the life of Shaina and Himanshu; the scene where Devi dances to the tune of "Saat Samundar Paar"; the final scene between Devi and Himanshu in the climax etc.
The dialogues written by Rajat Arora are just okay but it could have been better considering the past track record of the movies of Salman Khan as well as the dialogues written by Rajat Arora in the past. The only dialogue which is excellent is the final one which describes the the character of Devi Lal Singh "Main dil mein aata hoon, samajh mein nahin", This line works very well because not only it describe the character of Devi rather it describes the characteristics of Brand Salman movies too.

As a director Sajid Nadiwadwala has made a promising debut. He has handled the large scale

of the movie very well with good quality production values probably being the producer himself has helped him to make the movie on the required large scale. Though most of the movie is dominated by brand power of Salman Khan but his good directional skills are visible. His choice of actors and locations is very much appropriate as per the story.  He has used the computer graphics works very well in the film not only in the action sequences but also in other scenes too in a very innovative way like the use of a series of animations to describe the growing years of Devi Lal Singh or the use of a moving video clip of Himanshu's interview in a newspaper article to describe the interview written on the newspaper.The only thing he has missed out is a grand entry sequence of the hero Salman Khan. The entry sequence here is good but it could have been better also the love story between Devi and Shaina could have been shortened by few minutes.

The interesting thing about Salman Khan's acting is that whatever role he plays he always looks and acts like Salman Khan and he never tries to do anything else as he knows that his fans also love to see him as Salman Khan , the superstar not as the character. Probably his director also knows that so he has used an irrelevant reference of the immensely popular character Chulbul Pandey from Dabangg, which was also played by Salman Khan. So it is useless to comment about his acting abilities. But yes he has looked stylish and much fitter to perform the action sequences. He has performed with the coolness and style required for his on screen character. Also he has danced really well in the song "Jumme Ki Raat".

Jacqueline Fernandez has been a part of superhit movies earlier too and the experience of "Kick" will be no different for her. As an actress here too she has nothing much to do. But she has managed to look glamorous and sexy even with the thick glasses. Her solo dance sequence in the song "Jumme Ki Raat" is superb and it surely deserves seetis and clapping.
Also she has has a good chemistry with her onscreen partner Salman Khan.

Randeep Hooda has done full justice to his character of Himanshu a tough cop. His look, his attitude, his dialogue delivery everything is too good. In fact in such a non logical unrealistic movie his character looks very much realistic and well researched. He has done good job in the lighter moments too like the scenes where he bonds with Devi in a drunk situation or the scenes where he tries to express his feelings for Shaina.

Nawazuddin Siddiqui has made his debut in hardcore commercial movies with this film and he has proved his acting abilities here too. He has proved that a good actor is not bounded to any particular category rather he can act in any kind of cinema. Unlike his other movies here he is very loud and over the top and it has worked really well for the film. His evil laughter is just awesome. The only bad thing is the screen time he has been given. He has hardly 4-5 scenes, it would have been a better decision to give him a lengthier role.

Among the rest of the cast members Saurabh Shukla is excellent in his small role as Shaina's father. Every time he comes on the screen he will surely make you laugh. Unfortunately the same can not be said about Mithoon Chakraborty, the good actor has been wasted again in a stereotypical father's character. Archana Puran Singh is okay as the the loud over the top Punjabi mother of Devi. 

The technical team has worked very well. Ayananka Bose's camerawork is a visual treat for the audiences. He has shoot the outdoor locations of Poland very delightfully.The action sequences choreographed by Anl Arasu and Stefan Richter is breath taking. The visual effects are also very nice and it has enhanced the impact of the death-defying stunts very well.

There are not enough scope of songs in the movie still the songs has been forced in the screenplay. Apart from "Jumme Ki Raat" and "Hangover", the rest of the songs are not so good so most of the songs could have been avoided in the movie specially the item song featuring Nargis Fakri. No matter the song is situational or not but "Jumme Ki Raat" is one of the biggest highlights of the film. It is very much popular even before the release of the film and it will definitely help the business of the film. It has been nicely composed by Himesh Reshamiya and superbly choreographed by Ahmed Khan. Also the song "Hangover" is melodious and it is the only situational song in the film so it works well in the film too.

Overall it is yet another masala entertainer from Salman Khan for his fans. No matter how good or bad it will appeal to the audiences it will definitely break lots of box office records.If you are a Salman fan then you will obviously watch it but if you are not then also you can give it a try for the brilliant actors Randeep Hooda and Nawazuddin Siddiqui. Don't try to use your brain while watching this film rather feel this by your heart because the movie explains itself in the climax as "Mere baare me itna mat socho , main dil me aata hoon samajh me nahin".

Review of Humpty Sharma Ki Dulhania

After the success of "Hasee Toh Phasee" and "2 States" , Dharma production has presented another romantic comedy. Just like the previous two movies here too the story has nothing new to say but still it is thoroughly  enjoyable because of the fresh approach of the debutante director and for the wonderful performance by the fresh new lead pair.

From the opening credit itself you will understand that this movie is hugely inspired from the 1995 classic "Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge". Even the title of the movie also proves that. Story starts with Kavya Pratap Singh (Alia Bhatt) who lives in a village of Ambala with her parents, divorced sister and a lot of other typical Punjabi family stereotype relatives like biji and praji etc. She is about to marry a NRI guy Angad (Siddharth Shukla) who is his father's friend's son. Just one month before her marriage she goes to Delhi to attend her friend's engagement and to buy a designer lehanga for her wedding. Here she meets with Rakesh alias Humpty Sharma (Varun Dhawan) the only son of a bookstall owner. Humpty and Kavya becomes friends during some casual meetings which finally turns into love. But Kavya's marriage is already fixed with someone else so she comes back to her village sacrificing her love. Humpty follows her to her village just to win the heart of her family members so that he can marry her. What happened finally is known to all whoever has seen "Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge".

It is very clear from the beginning that the story has nothing new to tell. In such cases the screenplay writer has the responsibility to present the same old story in refreshing way. As the screenplay writer Shashank Khaitan has been successful to perform this responsibility but partially. The first half is quite engaging and funny but the energy level drops in the second half when the story tries to be serious and emotional which doesn't suit the mood of the film. But after sometime the fun element comes back with the introduction of Kavya's would be groom Angad. The last 10 minutes of the film are the most boring part as the climax looks very much stretched as everyone knows what will happen finally so there is no point to waste so much time to reach to that point. there are some scenes which have been literally lifted from "Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge" but still it can be said that it is not a scene by scene remake rather it is a modern day representation of Raj and Simran's love story. Another weak point of the script is  most of the characters are too much cliched. 

But all the shortcomings of the script and story has been compensated with the witty and funny dialogues written by the director and screenplay writer Shashank Khaitan himself.

As a director Shashank Khaitan has shown lots of promise in his debut movie. He has chosen a story which has been told so many times earlier but he has still managed to bring freshness to it. There is some engaging factor in the representation of the story and that shows that Shashank Khaitan is a good story teller. 

No matter how cliche their characters are both the leading actors Varun Dhawan and Alia

Bhatt have brought life to their characters with their fantastic performance. It is true that it is not their career best roles and they have played such characters earlier too but still the audience will feel connected with the characters of Humpty and Kavya. Both Varun and Alia have grown up a lot from their debut movie together and their on screen chemistry is crackling. The only problem with Varun Dhawan is he needs to act better in the emotional scenes but he has filled up that gap with his excellent comic timing and superb dancing skills. Once again Alia Bhatt has proved that she is the future of Bollywood. She looks good , dances well and of course acts well too.

Among the supporting cast the actors Sahil Vaid and Gaurav Pandey who have played the characters of Humpty's friends Poplu and Shonty will surely win everyone's heart. Watch them in the scenes where they starts dancing to some popular Bollywood songs in drunken condition. Asutosh Rana has made a good comeback as Kavya's father. Siddharth Shukla who is a very popular face on TV has made a confident debut but he does not have much scope to perform, rather more stress has been given to his well toned body and fitness. Probably because of his TV popularity he was a part of the film promotions but his screen time is very less and his onscreen character is less significant.

The music is definitely a weak point of this film. A rom-com always deserves some beautiful as well as popular songs. Here the only song which is good and has been used well in the story is "Samjhawan". Apart from that the other popular track is "Saturday Saturday" but this song has been used in the end credits so it doesn't add much value to the film. The rest of the songs are neither good nor catchy enough to be popular. As a result it looks like there are too many songs which has been forced in the movie. There are two engagement songs "D se Dance" and "Daingad Daingad" but none of them is popular, in such case one of them could have been easily edited out.The only saving grace is that the songs have been choreographed very well and the credit goes to the choreographers Remo D'souza , Ahmed Khan and Chinni Prakash. Also the good dancing skills of Varun Dhawan has worked in favor of the choreographers.

Overall the movie happily pays tribute to the classic "Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge" and it proudly accepts its inspiration. it never tries to pretend that it is original rather it always says it is "100% original fake". If you are a fan of  DDLJ then try its modern day version too. Also you can watch it to enjoy the funny dialogues and the energetic performance of the leading cast.

Review of Bengali movie "Galpo Holeo Satyi"

In Bengali Film industry now a days its very common to make the remake of a south Indian action potboiler but going against the normal rules director Birsa Dasgupta has taken an attempt to remake a South Indian horror film and it must be said he has adapted the story very well in Bengali film setup.

This is the story of a Pizza delivery boy Rudra (Soham Chakraborty) who live with his live in partner Anuradha (Mimi Chakraborty) who is a supernatural thriller writer. Their life was going on okay but one day Rudra goes to deliver Pizza to a haunted house and everything changes after that.

More than half of the story revolves around Rudra's encounter with the ghosts in the haunted house and in spite of using so many cliched horror elements still it looks interesting and is terrifying enough to give you some goose bumps. The screenplay has been adapted scene by scene from the original South Indian film so there is nothing to give credit here. There are some loop holes in the screenplay specially it comes to the audiences mind after the big twist towards the end. In the first 30 minutes a simple love story has been shown between Rudra and Mimi which is irrelevant to the main subject but due the beautiful chemistry of the leading pair it looks nice.

As a director Birsa Dasgupta has always tried to make movies in some different and uncommon genre. And he deserves credit for bringing back supernatural thriller to the Bengali cinema. His direction is nice from the portrayal of an young live in couple in Kolkata to the scenes in  the haunted house to the big twist in the end he has handled all that with perfection. Only he could have made some logical changes to the script towards the climax.

Soham Chakraborty has done a fantastic job as Rudra. For most of the parts in the haunted house sequences he has to act alone and he has carried away the scenes with his superb body language and expressions. It is probably one of his best performance.
Mimi Chakraborty has lesser screen time but she has managed to shine on her own within this limited scope. Her on screen chemistry with Soham is also very nice.

Among the supporting cast Rajatava Dutta is okay as Rudra's Boss. Sayani has done good job as the ghost in the haunted house.

In a horror film the technical team has a huge responsibility and the two persons who has done complete justice with their work are cinematographer Subhankar Bhar and sound designer Anirban Sengupta and Dipankar Chaki. For almost one hour during the haunted house scenes the cinematographer has to shoot using only a torch light and Subhankar Bhar has done full justice in those sequences with his camera. Apart from that his excellent camerawork can be seen in the song "Ei Bhalo Ei Kharap" too. The editing is okay. The visual effects are good. Only the make up artiste could have done a better job specially with the make up of the ghosts.

In a horror film there is not much scope of music but still music composer Indradip Dasgupta has managed to leave impression with the romantic song "Ei Bhalo Ei Kharap". Apart from that the background music is also good enough to create the spooky feeling. 

Overall "Galpo Holeo Satyi" is a good attempt to make a supernatural thriller. Maybe the twist at the end may not appeal to everyone but if you are a fan of horror films then you can give it a try specially for the brilliant performance of the leading couple and the technicians.

Review of Bobby Jasoos

There is always a hope that if it is a Vidya Balan movie then it must be a great story and a brilliant performance from the actress, but unfortunately this can not be said totally about Vidya's last two movies. Same thing is true for "Bobby Jasoos" too. The basic concept of the movie is very refreshing to introduce a female detective but the execution of this concept is not so good.

This is a story of not so young girl Bilkeesh aka Bobby(Vidya Balan) who is the elder daughter of a conservative Muslim family from Moghalpura Hyderabad. She wants to be a big detective someday but her father is totally against her dreams and wants her to get married and be settled. During her struggle to be a successful detective on her own, one day suddenly Bobby gets her big break from a mysterious rich man Anees Khan (Kiran Kumar) who wants her to search some missing persons with some strange clues like their name and some birthmarks. Bobby gets a huge amount as her fee and she happily agrees to do the job. After searching two girls Bobby realizes that she should verify the background of her client as well as she should track down the motive of Anees Khan behind the search. During her investigations she took help from Tasawur (Ali Fazal) who is a TV anchor and her client cum friend who turns out to be her love interest too at the end. In the climax Bobby gets answer to all her queries as well as the audience too gets the answers of the mystery but unfortunately the answers are not convincing enough.

The main problem with the screenplay is it is confused whether it is just a story of the struggle of an independent girl to make her own name going against all the odds or it is a conventional suspense thriller. If it will be considered as a thriller then it must be said it lacks the required pace of a thriller as well as the when the secret unfolds it lacks the shock value too. The audiences will surely feel cheated with such a loosely developed secret revelation at the climax. The romantic track between Bobby and Tasawur is also half backed as result it add no extra value to the main story. 

As a director Samar Sheikh has taken a brave step to tell an unconventional story but his narrative style is inconsistent there are some tracks which are quite enjoyable like the light hearted scenes in the first half but over all the total impact of his story telling is not so good. But for this he is not totally responsible as the script itself has lots of loose points. But one credit should be given to the director that is his perfection for the detailing. The background and body language of the characters look perfect. Also the the total setup of Moghulpura is very much authentic.

Vidya Balan has done a superb job as the main lead. She has done lots of disguises which are the main highlight of the film and she has done justice to all her disguised characters whether it is a peon of a govt office or a roadside beggar or a churiwala or a  TV producer or an astrologer.Her makeup ,costumes and body language everything is good for the different roles. But only problem is she does not looks young anymore, even for a 30 year old girl she looks overweight and over aged.

In the supporting casts Ali Fazal has acted very nice in his limited scope. Kiran Kumar is good as the mysterious man Anees Khan. Rajendra Gupta is good as Bobby's Father. Supriya Pathak and Zareena Wahab have very small role but they have done their job perfectly.

In the technical department the person who has shined is the production designer Tariq Umar Khan. He has created the locations very authentically. The dialogues are also well written and has a beautiful touch of Hyderabadi language.

There is not enough scope for songs in the movie. The only song which goes well in the movie is the song "Jashn". Apart from that "Tu" is a very nicely composed song, but the song has not been used properly in the movie.

Overall "Bobby Jasoos" is a film made with good intention but has not been executed properly. Still it can be enjoyed in parts specially for Vidya Balan. You will like Bobby but not her Jasoosi.