20131110: Horror Review--Scream

Scream

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. American live action feature length film, 1996, rated R, 111 minutes. Crime, horror, drama.
2. IMDB: 7.2/10.0 from 168,302 user ratings.  Aspect, 2.35; estimated budget, 15 million USD.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 80% on the meter; 72% liked it from 472,612 audience ratings.
4. Netflix: 3.3/5.0 from 5,146,403 user ratings.
5. Directed by: Wes Craven.
6. Starring:  Neve Campbell as Sidney Prescott, David Arquette as Deputy Dewey, Courteney Cox was Gale Weathers, Matthew Lillard as Stuart, Skeet Ulrich as Billy, Rose McGowen as Tatum, Drew Barrymore as Casey, Liev Schreiber as Cotton Weary, W. Earl Brown as Kenny, Lawrence Hecht as Mr. Prescott.


2. Setup and Plot
1. Casey and Steve get killed in the opening sequence, which sets much of the tone of the rest of the film.


2. The next day, the school where Casey and Steve had attended is abuzz with the news, and the local television channels are overflowing with it.


3. Sidney sat next to Casey in school, and her mother was assaulted and killed the year before.  The culprit was not apprehended.  A lot of the attention of the film flows to Sidney, her boyfriend Billy, plus their friends Stuart and Tatum.  Deputy Dewey knows Sidney from the year before.


4. We see the same MO working against Sidney the next night.  The perpetrator tells Sidney that her mother did not want to die.  Billy gets arrested for it.  Sidney gets to thinking about the two murder incidents, and the cops have a costume that looks like the one the perpetrator used.


5. Gale Weathers and her hapless, overweight cameraman Kenny try to get the story first.  Sidney cold cocks her, but apologizes the next morning.  Gale, on the other hand, insists that Sidney's mother was a slut, and that Sidney identified the wrong man at the trial.


6. Her classmates are more than a bit crude and insensitive.  Two of the boys wear a Halloween costume that resembles the one used by the killer.  Some of the girls speculate whether Sidney did the murders, and whether is was a pathetic cover up.  The killer finds her in the girls' room at school, and Sidney gets away via some good scrambling.


7. As the story progresses, the principal gets killed, Sidney's friend Tatum is killed, her boyfriend Billy gets knifed twice in the gut, Kenny gets his throat slit, and a couple more people get killed.


8. When the guilty are revealed, it makes sense from the earlier parts of the film.  Loose ends are tied up.


3. Conclusions
1. One line summary: An otherwise excellent film spoiled by its endless spoofing.
2. Four stars of five. 


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 10/10 Exceptional.


2. Sound: 10/10 Well done.


3. Acting: 10/10 Fine.  Neve Campbell and Skeet Ulrich gave particularly good performances.


4. Screenplay: 6/10 Too clever.  Too referential to the genre.  Too many references to other movies.  Too many sentences that start 'This the part where...'  If not for the spoofing, I would have rated this 5/5, and ranked it among the best horror films I have ever seen.

20131109: Bollywood Review--I Hate Luv Storys

I Hate Luv Storys

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. Indian live action feature length film, 2010, NR, 134 minutes, spoken word is Hindi, subtitles in English.  Comedy, drama, romance.
2. IMDB: 5.4/10.0 from 3,594 user ratings.  Estimated budget, 100 million INR.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 'No score yet...' and 46% liked it from 3,868 audience ratings.
4. Netflix: 3.5/5.0 from 140,576 audience ratings.
5. Directed by: Punit Malhotra.
6. Starring:  Imran Khan as Jay Dhingra, Sanom Kapoor as Simran, Sammir Dottani as Raj Dholakia, Samir Soni as Veer Kapoor.


2. Setup and Plot
1. Simran is the protagonist; I'm cringing already.  I did not care for Sanom Kapoor in Aisha, which she dominated to the point of drowning an otherwise sturdy film.


2. Simran has a Punjabi father and a Gujarati mother.  She works in Mumbai as a movie art director.  She is in love with Raj Dholakia, her fiance, whom her mother favours.  Veer Kapoor, Simran's boss, assigns Jay Dhingra to work in the same department as Simran; friction arises.  She's a sentimentalist, he loathes romance.


3. So, how will the love triangle proceed?


4. The project they will be working is on location in New Zealand.  Do we ever get there?  Jay is a dog, and tries to break up Simran and Raj.  That goes on for too long.  Jay should have been fired several times over for insubordination.


5. Jay makes Simran laugh, Raj does not.  After working together for a while, she invites Jay to have dinner at a restaurant with her and her parents.  He turns on the charm, as always.  Jay and Simran spend even more time together.  Raj tells Simran he's going to Delhi; he hopes his old Simran is present when he comes back.


6. Simran thinks she's fallen in love with Jay, but he's still a dog.  She is rather hurt when she catches him with another woman.  She tells him her feelings, and he tells her sentimental love is nonsense.  She agrees and gets rather depressed.  He finds that he misses her smile.  She breaks up with Raj.  She leaves early for the new project.  Jay has a lot of regrets with musical accompaniment.  He tries his old stomping grounds to pick up someone, but fails for lack of will.  Eventually he goes to the project in New Zealand, and starts seeing Simran again.


7. Oh, this goes on forever.  Raj shows up on set as well, just to make things interesting.


8. Jay goes direct to Simran, but she tells him she just cannot go through loving him again.  He tries indirect via Giselle, for the jealousy angle.  Liked the 'blah, blah, blah' scenes with Raj, Simran, and Giselle.


9. Raj and Simran get engaged.  Raj and her parents are happy, but Simran is not.  Ah, too bad.


10. So, how will this resolve?  With multiple cliches, of course.


3. Conclusions
1. References many Bollywood and some Hollywood films via posters, DVD covers, and the like.  Oh, the cliches.
2. One line summary: Bollywood spoof dominated by two mediocre stars and a dozen cliches.
3. Three stars of five.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 10/10 Varies from competent plus to extremely beautiful.


2. Sound: 10/10 No problems.  Incidental music is a bit florid, but lovely to the ear.


3. Acting: 3/10 Imran Khan, minus four.  Sanom Kapoor, minus three.  The movie sinks or swims with these two, given the proportion of screen time spent on them.  They are irritating, while not entertaining.  Otherwise, dull but competent performances.


4. Screenplay: 4/10 This would have been a nice 20 minute short.  The film is low in content, long on making Jay look like an idiot.  He completed that task in the first three or four minutes onscreen.  Continuing to beat the dead horse is not helpful.  Raj is made out to be a placeholder punching bag, so the level of romantic tension is always underwater.


5. Musical Numbers: 6/10 First one (I Hate Luv Storys) was OK.  Second, Jay making fun of sentimental Indian films, not nearly as good.  Third (Simran and Jay spending time together) fine singing, but I missed the dancing.  Fourth (Simran and Jay dancing in public) singing good, but short.  Fifth (in movie dance and song) was rather nice.....'Lost and Lonely' was beautiful, as was the number where Jay is daydreaming during a shoot beneath the mountains in NZ.

20131109: Horror Review--VHS 2

V/H/S/2

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. American live action feature length film, 2013, rated R, 95 minutes,
2. IMDB: 6.1/10.0 from 10,042 audience ratings.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 72% on the meter; 56% liked it from 7,954 audience ratings.
4. Netflix: 3.4/5.0 from 80,326 audience ratings.
5. 'Two private eyes investigating the disappearance of a student discover horrific content on a collection of VHS tapes in his home.'
6. Directed by: Simon Barrett.
7. Starring: Lawrence Michael Levine as Larry, Kelsey Abbot as Ayesha, L. C. Holt as Kyle, Simon Barrett as Steve, Mindy Robinson as Tabitha, Monica Sanchez Navarro as Hotel Maid.


2. Setup and Plot
1. Tape 49
2. Two PIs (Larry, Ayesha) investigate the disappearance of a student.  They encounter masses of VHS tape and other media to traverse to look for clues.


3. Phase I Clinical Trials----Ayesha watches this one.
4. A man has a bionic eye implanted.  Great, a new type of anti-steady camera.  The company who is testing it records every thing he does.  When he gets home, things go bump in the night.


5. A Ride in the Park----Ayesha watches this one as well; Larry continues with the kid's notebooks.  They agree that the kid on the tape is the client's target.
6. Yet another fool.  This one listens to loud music while biking in a wooded park.  He has a web-cam on his safety helmet.  Why have a safety helmet if you choose to ignore all auditory clues to your environment?  Makes as much sense and listening to loud music while driving.  He gets attacked by zombies.  End of interest.  I've seen much better zombie material.


7. Safe Haven-----After the zombie tape, Ayesha has a nosebleed, but has left her meds at home.  Larry goes to get something for her at a nearby drugstore.  This seems like a mistake.
8. Set in Indonesia.  Intrepid journalists observe a cult and interview its members for possibly improprieties and or felonies.  The lead, Malik, is engaged to Lena, but she has gotten pregnant by another man in the crew, Adam.  What could possibly go wrong?  The celebration of cliches is strong here.  Mass suicide, zombies, demons, cults, gore fest.


9. Slumber Party Alien Abduction---Larry returns with OTC painkillers, but Ayesha has shot herself.  Oi.  Instead of calling the paramedics or the cops, Larry looks at a VHS tape near Ayesha scrawled with 'WATCH'.
10. Family of four in the slightly upscale suburbs.  Late teen daughter, early teen son.  Mom and Dad leave, friends of both children arrive.  The house is near a lake; hijinks with water (pistols loaded with urine, water balloons, splashing) ensue.  Younger group is put down, but not all that harshly.
11. Later, the younger group crash one of the couples starting intercourse.  Sigh. Reprisals are inevitable by the older teens.
12. In the middle of this, the bumps in the night start, and any originality vanished.  This time the cliche is alien abduction, and it is done badly.  Worst looking aliens I have seen in years.


13. Tape 49 wrap up: Larry finds his client's target, plus he and Ayesha find their places in the tapes.


3. Conclusions
1. Netflix review: 'Low budget, not as weird as vhs1, In comparison, gory replaces creepy and thematically it's unforgivably unimaginative.'
2. That covers a lot of the comparison.  The other part would be that VHS2 had close to acceptable video and audio.
3. One line summary: One hundred times better than V/H/S, but still a mediocre zombie movie.
4. Three stars of five.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 6/10 So much better than VHS since many minutes were shot with stationary cameras of reasonable quality.  Still, there were also many minutes of hand-held but not steady-cam.  Weak focus, lighting, framing, and so on.


2. Sound: 7/10 Reasonable, but sometimes as bad as the weaker parts of the video.


3. Acting: 6/10 There was some acting here, as opposed to V/H/S.


4. Screenplay: 5/10 The stories were better since I could make out what was going on.  The difference with V/H/S was more about better equipment, and better acting, not about better writing.

20131109: Horror Review--VHS

V/H/S

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. American live action feature length film, 2012, rated R, 116 minutes.  Spoken language is English.
2. IMDB: 5.7/10.0 from 24,860 audience ratings.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 55% on the meter; 41% from 12,868 audience ratings.
4. Netflix: 3.2/5.0 from 420,630 audience ratings.  804 users posted reviews.
5. Directed by:  Many, see below.
6. Starring, Tape 56 (the connecting arc): Calvin Reeder as Gary, Lane Hughes as Zak, Kentucker Audley as Rox, Adam Wingate as Brad.
7. Starring, 'Amateur Night': Hannah Fierman as Lily, Mike Donlan as Shane, Joe Sykes as Patrick, Drew Sawyer as Clint, Jas Sames as Lisa.
8. Starring, 'Second Honeymoon':  Joe Swanberg as Sam, Sophia Takal as Stephanie, Kate Lyn Shell as Girl, Graham Resnick as Local DJ.
9. Starring, 'Tuesday the 17th': Drew Moerlein as Joey, Jeanine Elizabeth Yoder as Samantha, Jason Yachanin as Spider, Bryce Burke as The Glitch, Norma C. Quinones as Wendy.
10. Starring, '...Emily...': Helen Rogers as Emily, Daniel Kaufman as James, Liz Harvey as The New Girl, Isaiah Hillman as Boy Alien, Corrie Lynne Fitzpatrick as Girl Alien.
11. Starring, '10/31/98': Chad Villella as Chad, Matt Bettinelli as Matt, Tyler Gillett as Tyler, Paul Natonek as Paul.


2. Setup and Plot
1. This is a collection of shorts.  In the ruling arc, thieves are hired by an anonymous third party to steal a rare VHS tape from an isolated house.  The thieves find a dead body plus a host of VHS tapes.  They watch the likely tapes to find the target that will get them money from their employer.


2. Tape 56 (directed by Adam Wingate):  The opening shows a small crew of petty thugs filming while: forcibly exposing a woman's breasts in public, vandalizing an abandoned building, being intimate with a girl friend who does not know about the camera.  They discuss rates.  Fifty bucks for each porn incident, and so on.  One of the crew recommends jump shifting to loftier crimes that pay better.  
3. They line it up, and that starts the adventure of finding that one special tape.  They find a dead older man plus a great deal of television equipment for viewing.  Beyond that, they find a supply of video tapes that they decide to go through to get the target.
4. As the film goes through the segments, the thugs meet problems that they cannot solve.


5. Amateur Night (directed by David Bruckner): Shane and Patrick setup Clint with 'video glasses' so he can record what is in front of him.  They go to a bar and pick up Lisa and Lily and proceed to a motel.  Lisa soon passes out.  Patrick seems terminally drunk, and only sits and laughs.  Lily wants to do things with Clint, who shies away from the opportunity.  Shane takes off Lily's dress, which was all she was wearing.  Clint gets enough courage to record Shane and Lily.  Patrick is still wobbly, but he takes off his clothes so he can sandwich Lily with Shane.  Clint runs away again; Lily bites Patrick.  Lily is straddling Shane as Clint approaches again.  She's morphed into a vampire.  Things end very badly for Shane, Patrick, and Clint.  Oddly, these large hulking fellows (Shane and Patrick) do not even try to defend themselves against the 90 pound Lily.


6. Second Honeymoon (directed by Ti West):  Sam and Stephanie go on a road trip in the desert of the American West for their second honeymoon.  They are recording a tape for future memories.
7. These are two germaphobes on a field trip who stop at cheap jack motels.  Clever.
8. Sam wants to record Stephanie while they are making out; she demurs.  Sigh.  Turn the camera off and record later.  Knock at the door; it is some girl who asks for a ride the next day.  The figure Sam saw earlier quietly breaks in, steals 100 USD from Sam, nearly cuts up Stephanie's underwear while she's still in it, but makes a clean, silent getaway.
9. The next day they discuss the loss of 100 USD, but do not figure it out.  They do some sight-seeing and plan the remaining parts of the trip.  That night, they get a visitor who films them again.  This time, she kills Sam, and records herself kissing Stephanie.  Ah, pro-lesbian PC, plus anti-male PC.


10. Tuesday the 17th (directed by Glenn McQuaide): Joey, Samantha, Spider, and Wendy are on a field trip.  They stop by a lake for a drug smoking break, then go swimming.  Wendy tells a story about a killer who took out four people by the very same lake.  Then she laughs it off.  Spider and Samanthe get a giant knife through their brains.  Wendy gets the camera, then returns to Joey, and asks him to have sex with her.  Things do not turn out well for Joey or for Wendy.


11. The Sick Thing That Happened to Emily When She Was Younger (directed by Joe Swanberg): Weird things happen as Emily and James have a video conference.  She refers to a time when she and James were apart when they were young, and bad things happened to her.  He should have recorded their chat the second time when the weird noises start.  She uses a Kodak on her living room and catches the figure of a child. 
12. She asks the super of her apartment about previous deaths in her apartment.  No such thing; the only renters were students without children.  That night he records, and several figures are captured on the chat.  They start a partial dissection of Emily.  James is in cahoots with them.  James keeps communicating with her, and never lets her know what a complete traitor his is.  How can this turn out?  Was Emily the only one James is abusing?


13. 10/31/98 (directed by Radio Silence):
14. Four young adult males (Chad, Matt, Tyler, and Paul) go to a Halloween costume party.  They bring a nanny cam.  The house where the party is to be held has an unlocked door with the lights on.  No one is at home.  They keep looking for the party.
15. They call out for their friend Justin, who should be there, but no such luck.
16. They hear voices in the attic, and think that is where the party is.  They find several men torturing a tied up woman.  At first they think it is the party, but the torturers very much convince them it is not.  They run away at first, but decide her trouble is for real, and go back to save her.  That sort of works until she leads them into more problems.


3. Conclusions
1. This is one of the worst films I have ever seen.
2. One line summary: Thieves review ever more horrifying tapes in order to get paid.
3. One star of five.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 2/10 Features low-end cameras, bad framing, insufficient light, bad focus, and terrible lack of contrast.  Then of course, there are shaking camera movements, anti-relevant POV, and old bad recording media.  One of my least favorites is where the camera is left on to record time going by in a room where nothing moves, often in complete darkness.


2. Sound: 5/10 Who cares?  More often noise than anything else: audio chaos to go with the video chaos.


3. Acting: 0/10 The only actor of note is the camera.  The camera trumps the efforts of all actors.


4. Screenplay: 2/10 Boring.  Short on plot.  Badly executed with next to zero motivation.  Worst of all, not the least bit scary.

20131108: Animation Review--Arjun Warrior Prince

Arjun the Warrior Prince

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. Indian animated feature length film, 2012, NR, 94 minutes, animation, adventure.  Spoken language is Hindi, subtitles in English.
2. IMDB: 6.7/10.0 from 781 audience ratings.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 57% on the meter; 68% liked it from 1,772 from audience ratings.
4. Netflix: 3.5/5.0 from 38,894 audience ratings.
5. Directed by: Arnad Chaudhuri.
6. Starring: Yuddvir Bakoliya as Arjun, Ila Arun as Kunti, Anjun Srivastav as Lord Shiva, Sachin Khedekar as Lord Krishna, Vishnu Sharma as Bheeshma.


2. Setup and Plot
1. Arjun is a young noble in training to be a warrior.


2. Opportunities arise to show that the training took.


3. About half way into the film, the consistent message is "he is not ready."


4. Then through his inaction, his family's enemies burn down their compound.


5. Through a contest, followed by a lot of hard work, their fortunes are restored.


6. Then he is a king dispensing justice.  I do not believe that.


7. Then he plays a crooked game of chance and loses everything, including his princess.  Brilliant.  He bets again, with banishment for 12 years being his wager.  Great. The city that he and his family built is lost.  Amazing incompetence.  His bride tries to galvanize him.  He travels to the region of the gods to gain something or another. An old decrepit man beats the living daylights out of him.  That was pleasant.  We later find that old man to be Shiva in disguise.


8. By the time he was attacked by the army of demons from all sides, I was rooting for the demons to kill this useless waste of skin.  Unfortunately, he lives and is rewarded with a fine bow by the Gods themselves.


9. He and his few friends plot to rid themselves of the scum who cheated them out of so much.  Their plans are overheard, even though the wily Krishna was supposedly helping them.


10. The film jump-shifts to the enemies of Arjun feinting to draw most of his allies away, then attacking the heart of the stronghold where he lives.  Just finding them will bring down 12 more years of banishment.  Again, just incredibly clever.  There are 3 men to defend.


11. Arjun, dressed as a woman, comes out with the local prince, Yuvraj, perhaps 12 years of age.  They find Arjun's real weapons, and the one-against-an-army fight begins.  Even in this, Arjun demonstrates his incompetence.  He should have been slain three times or so.


12. The invitation to a sequel is made at the end.  May it not be so.


3. Conclusions
1. I saw The Mahabharata (1989 live action film by Peter Brook), which I thoroughly enjoyed.  This bad animation is nonsense in comparison.
2. One line summary: What should have been a stellar film is a technical and writing disaster.
3. One star of five.


4. Scores
1. Art/Animation: 2/10 The visuals do catch the eye, but not always in a good way.  Too much of the action looks like the characters are on one layer, and the backgrounds on another.  More than anything else, it looks like the 'flattening' of the layers for presentation was poorly thought out in terms of 3d light sources.  The characters look disassociated for that reason.  The backgrounds look great as backgrounds, while the character images look (barely) competent; the flattened final product, on the other hand, looks fake. The characters are often simplistic, rigid, and moving in odd ways as well as being ill-lit. This was a huge let down, an ongoing irritation that just never goes away.  Clearly a great deal of effort was expended on the backgrounds.  It is too bad that similar effort was not spent on making sure the final rendering did not throw that all away.


2. Sound: 8/10 OK.  Loved the singing in the closing credits.


3. Screenplay: 2/10 The narration seems jumpy, and short on exposition.  The Arjun character, the centre of the story, is just not believable as a hero, not believable as a king, not believable as an inspirational warrior capable of turning the tide of war.  The camaraderie between Arjun and Krishna I was expecting seemed almost absent.  The scene where Arjun shoots the golden fish is anti-climactic because there is less than zero motivation for it.  He is portrayed repeatedly as a foul-up, a child, someone incapable of protecting his own.  Then he does this mighty deed requiring great skill and huge strength?  Are we viewers all supposed to be idiots who accept anything? The centre of the action remains re-enforcing the strongly etched image of Arjun's worthlessness up to about 70 minutes into the film.  The last 24 minutes did not change that image.

20131107: Animation Review--The Painting

The Painting (le tableau)

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. French animated feature length film, 2011, NR, 76 minutes.  Spoken language is French, subtitles in English.
2. IMDB: 7.1/10.0 from 999 user ratings.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 80% on the meter; 73% liked it from 912 audience ratings.
4. Netflix: 3.1/5.0 from 1,887 audience ratings.
5. Written and directed by: Jean-Francois Laguione.


2. Setup and Plot
1. The Painting is about a painting in a painter's home.  The painting is incomplete in several ways.  The painting has a chateau, a flowering garden, and a dangerous forest, plus a multitude of characters.


2. The characters are divided into (Toupins, Pafinis, Reufs) or (Alldunns, Halfies, Sketchies) in English.  In the conceit of the film, the Toupins (completed, fully painted characters) decide they should rule the proceedings, treating the Pafinis (part finished) badly, and enslaving the Reufs (rough sketches).


3. The protagonist is Lola, a 'Halfie.'  Her Halfie friend Claire has fallen in love with a completed character, Ramo.  Ramo tries to speak against the bad behaviour of the Alldunns in the chateau, but is shouted down.  Claire is imprisoned.  Lola, Ramo, and a Sketchie named Quill escape the painted through a perimeter weakness in the forest.


4. Once outside, the painting style shifts to a mixed one.  Our heroes keep their form and colours, but the outside is rendered in strongly realistic terms.  This is executed quite well.


5. The trio interact with characters in the painter's other paintings.  Eventually they find that they can paint themselves.  They speak with the painter's self-portrait, and gather up paint and brushes to take back the the painting of origin.


6. Their return increases the chaos for a while, but levels out the inequalities.


7. The ending where Lola again departs the painting and speaks with the painter is just delightful.  There is another shift of mixing styles which is also well done.


3. Conclusions
1. One line summary: Another fine recent animation effort from France.
2. Five stars of five.


4. Scores
1. Art/Animation: 10/10 Breath-taking.


2. Sound: 10/10 No problems.


3. Screenplay: 10/10 Loved the imaginative story with interesting infrastructure, and beautiful ending.

20131107: Animation Review--Tales of the Night

Tales of the Night (Les contes de la nuit)

1. Production Fundamentals; reception
1. French animated feature length film, 2011, NR, 83 minutes, aspect 1.78; fantasy.
2. IMDB: 6.5/10.0 from 655 audience ratings.  Spoken word is English, which was rather unexpected; English subtitles.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 78% on the meter; 60% liked it from 2,114 audience ratings.
4. Netflix: 3.4/5.0 from 19,089 audience ratings.
5. Written and directed by Michel Ocelot.
6. Starring: Julien Beramis as Boy, Marine Griset as Girl, Michel Elias.


2. Setup, Plot
1. The film breaks into six separate adventures.


2. Night of the Werewolf. Being a prince and a werewolf in the 15th century.  Happy ending on this one; murderous deceit receives justice instead of monetary reward.


3. Jon Jon and Beauty Not Knowing.  On a Caribbean island, Jon Jon explores a deep cave which is the country of the dead.  The only other living being is the princess whose name is Beauty Not Knowing.  Jon Jon befriends the 3 monsters he was warned to kill.  The father of the princess sets him three tasks.  The 3 monsters help him through the final tests.  Jon Jon goes back to his girl friend in the land of the living.


4. The City of Gold. The Boy saves The Girl from being a human sacrifice, but at a cost.


5. Tom-Tom Boy.  Set in a village in the African bush.  Everyone in the village tells Tom-Tom Boy to learn something useful, and to get lost in the meantime.  He saves an old man's life out in the wild.  This man is the custodian of the magic tom-tom, 'whose rhythms no one can resist.'  He plays for the custodian, who teaches him to do more with it.


6. The Boy Who Never Lied.  Set in Tibet.  Two kings each wager half their kingdoms on whether or not the Boy can be made to lie.  The princess volunteers to help her father get the Boy to lie.  The Boy's horse speaks; the princess' mare can sing.  The lying princess acts sick, and claims that she must eat the heart of his talking horse.  The horse, Melonge, gives up his life so that his heart can be claimed.  The Boy serves up the heart, but the princess leaves with the heart untouched.  Ah, sadness.  But the Boy and his king are rewarded, and the princess admits the vileness of what she has done.


7. The Young Doe and the Architect's Son.  Zachariac, the sorcerer, has a young ward, Maud, who falls in love with the architect's son, Thibault.  Thibault climbs Zachariac's dread tower to rescue Maud.  He encourages her to agree to marry Zachariac, with the understanding that Thibault will interrupt the process before it is complete.  Thibault and Maud escape via a secret trapdoor in the cathedral.  Zachariac renounces Maud, and changes her into a doe who only runs from Thibault.  Thibault and his father's friend find the palace of a fairy ally of the architect.  Can they complete the resolution?


3. Conclusions
1. One line summary: Fairy tales done very well using an old style and modern techniques.
2. Five stars of five.


4. Scores
1. Art/Animation: 10/10 Though only in one style, wonderful throughout.


2. Sound: 10/10 No problems.  Liked the incidental music.


3. Acting: 10/10 Beautifully voiced.


4. Screenplay: 10/10 Difficult and wonderful.

20131107: Movie Review--Total Retribution

Total Retribution (Earthkiller)

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. American live action video release, 2011, rated R, 83 minutes, horror, scifi, thriller; spoken word is English.
2. IMDB: 2.2/10.0 from 224 user ratings.  Estimated budget, 1.5 million USD.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 'No reviews yet,' and no responses from audiences.
4. Netflix: 2.3/5.0 from 45,596 audience ratings.
5. Directed by: Andrew Bellware.
6. Starring: Robin Kurtz as Helen, Walter Barnes as Trig, Jeff Beuerlein as Milton, Greg Oliver Bodine as Schroeder, Lucy Rainer as Raze.


2. Setup and Plot
1. Terran Special Forces versus Allied Airborne on a space station, whatever that might mean.  Humans are being turned into zombies, sort of.  These zombies are not weaker; instead, they are quicker, stronger, smarter, and less and less vulnerable to weapons as they get older.  The zombie transformation is accomplished by programmed nanobots, not viruses or bacteria or radioactive substances.  There are androids as well as humans and zombies.


2. The protagonist, Helen, is an android who wakes up after a memory wipe.  Half an hour in, I've got context, more or less.


3. Throw in a solar cannon that creates wormholes through time.  Right, why not?  There's a mission to protect the cannon from the wrong people.  Just what the 'real' mission is, is a bit wobbly.


4. Throw in references to scripture.  What scripture?  Written by whom?


5. Just what do these people eat or drink?  Where to they get their energy?  (No solar panels on the space station, no nuclear generator.  Hm.) When did gravity generators get invented?  The people walk around on the space station as if it were a building on Earth.


6. Will the final mission be accomplished, so that scripture will be fulfilled?  That seems to be the question.


3. Conclusions
1. Whoever put up the 1.5 million USD got cheated.  Costumes, SFX, anti-actors, dialog, and sets are all terrible.
2. One line summary: Fools slaughter each other on a space station.
3. One stars of five; three blackholes for acting, screenplay, and SFX.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 7/10 Mostly good, but loaded with bad framing choices.


2. Sound: 5/10 Poor.


3. Acting: 0/10 Non-existent.


4. Screenplay: 0/10 Boring, absurd, almost context free.


5. SFX: 0/10 Beyond bad.  Done by people who have no acquaintance with physics, or just hate it.  The CGI is ridiculous for the most part. Blood effects are entirely laughable.

20131106: Comedy Review--Movie 43

Movie 43

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. 2013, rated R, 94 minutes, comedy.
2. IMDB: Estimated budget, 6 million USD.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 4% on the meter; 26% liked it from 29,478 audience ratings.
4. Netflix: 3.0/5.0 from 349,671 audience ratings.
5. Directed by: Peter Farrelly, Elizabeth Banks, Steven Brill, et alia.
6. Starring: 
7. Segment, The Catch: Kate Winslet as Beth, Hugh Jackman as Davis, Julie Clair as Pamela,
8. Segment, The Pitch: Dennis Quaid as Charlie Wessler, Greg Kinnear as Griffin Schraeder, Seth MacFarlane as himself.
9. Segment, Homeschooled: Liev Schreiber as Robert, Naomi Watts as Samantha, Alex Cranmer as Sean, Julie Ann Emerie as Clare, Austin Cope as High School Student.
10. Segment, The Proposition: Anna Faris as Vanessa, Chris Pratt as Jason, J. B. Smoove as Larry, Jarrad Paul as Bill.
11. Segment, Veronica: Kieran Culkin as Neil, Emma Stone as Veronica, Arthur French as Old Man, Josh Shuman as Short Guy.
12. Segment, iBabe:  Cathy Clifton as iBabe #1, Richard Gere as Boss, Kate Bosworth as Arlene, Jack McBrayer as Brian, Aasif Mandvi as Robert, Zach Lasry as Boy.
13. Segment, Superhero Speed Dating:  Justin Long as Robin, Uma Thurman as Lois Lane, Kristen Bell as Suprgirl, John Hodgman as Penguin, Leslie Bibb as Wonder Woman, Jason Sudeikis as Batman.
14. Segment, Machine Kids:  Ed Blythe as Vending Machine Man, Olivia Roberts Payne as Vending Machine Child.
15. Segment, Middleschool Date: Christopher Mintz-Plaase as Mikey, Partrick Warburton as Dad, Chloe Grace Moretz as Amanda.


2. Setup and Plot
1. Charlie Wessler pitches Griffin Schraeder a more than screwed up movie idea.


2. That's the conceit of the film.  Griffin objects, but Charlie pulls a gun on him.  Via some misadventures, Griffin's boss insists that Griffin go ahead with the project.


3. The segments are many and short.


4. Most of the segments are rude, crude, and barbaric.


5. Luckily most of the shorts are laugh out loud funny.


6. However, don't pursue if you do not like earthy humor.


3. Conclusions
1. One of the segments might be PC, but it looked more like straight up racist contempt to me.  Overall this picture is not for the thin-skinned.
2. One line summary: A compilation of short vignettes, mostly of the earthy humour type.
3. Three stars of five.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 10/10 Sharp.


2. Sound: 10/10 No problems.


3. Acting: 7/10 Mixed.  Some hilarious; some incredibly irritating.


4. Screenplay: 5/10 A better name for this film would be 'Miscellaneous crap from the Cutting Room Floor.'  

20131106: Bollywood Review--Ragini MMS

Ragini MMS

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. Indian live action feature length film, 2011, rated R, 93 minutes, drama, horror, thriller.  Spoken word is Hindi; subtitles in English.
2. IMDB: 4.9/10.0 from 1,143 user ratings.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 'No reviews yet,' and 33% liked it from 40 user ratings.
4. HuluPlus: 'The weekend getaway quickly changes gears as they find themselves in a house that has been rigged with cameras. The cameras that were meant to capture love-making are witness to something that is beyond the realm of human understanding.'
5. Directed by: Pawan Kripalani.
6. Starring: Kainaz Motivala as Ragini,  Raj Kumar Yadav as Uday,  Mangala Ahire as Witch, Harsh as Friend-1, Janice as Pia.


2. Setup and Plot
1. Uday and Ragini go on a trip to enjoy each other's company at a secluded house.  Uday records some of this with his handheld.  At the house they stay at, there were many cameras, so much of the movie does not suffer from Uday's shaky hands.


2. The MMS is for Multimedia Messaging Service, which allows for multimedia content to be sent over a variety of devices.  This would allow for online sex escapades and the like. As in many USA/UK horror films of recent vintage, way too many frames of the movie are of rooms where nothing is moving; perhaps with sound, perhaps not.


3. Uday handcuffs Ragini to a bed; they start intimate activities, but paranormal influences put them off before they get anywhere.  Uday cannot find the key to the cuffs.  Nice.  Ragini sees the cameras, and is displeased with Uday.


4. A voice from somewhere repeats 'I am not a witch,' 'I did not kill my children,' and 'This is my house.'


5. There is a long interval of Ragini, alone, suffering, trying to figure out how to get free of the cuffs and the bed.  Ragini finally gets loose about the time that two other people are about to open up the house.  She never connects with the two men; she has trouble flagging down the infrequent vehicles on a nearby road.


6. Toward the end, the witch drags Ragini back to the house, but somehow does not manage to kill her.  This makes no particular sense given the ease at which it dispatched the men.


3. Conclusions
1. Why was this rated R?  For language, I suppose, certainly not for skin.  The horror aspect was rather light both for suspense and for gore.
2. This is a cheap jack horror film made with hand held cameras and fixed web cams.  Most of the conversation is in English; a bit is in Hindi.
3. The end was another cheesy element, and could have been dropped without loss.
4. One line summary: Blair Witch meets Paranormal Activity done badly with Indian actors.
5. Two stars of five.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 4/10 Web cam quality at best; hand-held unsupervised at worst.


2. Sound: 7/10 Better than the video.


3. Acting: 5/10 Kainaz Motivala was fairly good; everyone else was rather bad.


4. Screenplay: 2/10 In 93 minutes I experienced about 30 minutes of irritation (the hand-held camera part), and 63 minutes of boredom from the web-cam segments.  'The medium is the message' is all too true here.  I did not see much storytelling done.

20131106: Bollywood Review--Perfect Mismatch

Perfect Mismatch (It's a Mismatch)

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. Indian live action feature length film, 2009, PG, 92 minutes, comedy, drama, romance
2. IMDB: 6.0/10.0 from 56 audience ratings. Estimated budget: 2 million USD.  Spoken language is English.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 'No reviews yet,' and 20% like it from 12 audience ratings.
4. HuluPlus: 'three couples and how they approach the modern day Indian marriage.'
5. Directed by: Ajmal Zaheer Ahmed.  Story by Anubhav Anand.
6. Starring: Anubhav Anand as Aman Sukhwinder Bhalla, Anupam Kher as Mr. Bhalla, Simran Bhar as Young Preeti Bhalla, Ranjita Chakravarty as Mrs. Bhalla, Nandana Sen as Neha D. Patel, Rashmi Rustagi as Meena D. Patel (Neha's mother), Boman Irani as Dinesh Patel (Neha's father).


2. Setup and Plot
1. NRI (non-resident Indian) in California, specifically in Riverside.  Aman the architect gets his job sold out from underneath him.  About the same time he meets Neha.  They get to know each other; Neha wants her parents to meet Aman, but they favor the son of their doctor.


2. Sigh.  Aman is Punjabi, while Neha is Gujarati; as Dinesh says, 'They eat meat, they drink, they are loud, and they are not classy like us.'  Mr. Bhalla does not like taking his shoes off, having no meat, no alcohol, no enthusiasm for loud jokes.  His gift of a bottle of booze is not well-received.


3. Aman prepares a presentation for an architectural design contest.  He makes the final 100, and gets a trip to New York to pitch his design in person.


4. After being a tad harsh toward his uncle, Aman accidentally discovers correspondence between his uncle and his father.  His father has suffered catastrophic losses against the large loan that his uncle had taken out for him.  His uncle is in a deep well of debt; that's why he works even on Sundays.


5. The offer from New York does not come through.  At least that is the lie that Aman tells at first.  Aman takes a position with his uncle's company.


6. Neha and Aram stage a song and dance number.  This starts out very well, but does not stay that way.  Aram and Neha break up after that, and a lot of derivative sadness starts.


7. For their own reasons, Mr. Bhalla and Dinesh agree to try to fix things up for Aman and Neha at the Diwali celebration.


8. Will that work out?  Will Aman straighten out the misstep with the design contest?


3. Conclusions
1. Story by the lead actor; this sounds like a vanity film, which are usually not worth seeing.
2. One line summary: Punjabi versus Gujarati customs on several levels.
3. Three stars of five.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 9/10 A little too soft focus for me, but otherwise fine.


2. Sound: 7/10 Good.  Music and singing are often in the background instead of in the foreground with dance.  I missed the spoken word being in a language from the Indian subcontinent.


3. Acting: 6/10  Liked Anupam Kher, Boman Irani, Nandana Sen.  I could have done without Anubhav Anand, the anchor about the neck that drags the movie underwater.


4. Screenplay: 5/10 Vanity project; plays like a protracted soliloquy.

20131105: Bollywood Review--Mere Baap Pehle Aap

Mere Baap Pehle Aap: My Father's Wedding (2008)

1. Production Fundamentals; reception
1. 2008, NR, 157 minutes, Bollywood.
2. IMDB: 4.8/10.0 from 824 user ratings. Spoken word is in Hindi; English subtitles.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 'No reviews yet,' and 57% liked it from 10 user ratings.
4. HuluPlus: 'Chirag and Gaurav are two kids brought up by their father Janardhan Rane.'
5. Directed by Priyadarshan; screenplay by Manisha Korda; story by Priyadarshan.
6. Starring: Paresh Rawal as Janaradhan Vishamber Rane, Akshaye Khanna as Gaurav J. Rane, Minoj Joshi as Chirag J. Rane, Genelia D'Souza as Sheekha N. Kapoor, Om Puri as Madhav Mathur.


2. Setup, Plot
1. 'Who says only young people can get married?'


2. Janaradhan wants to get married again.  His two sons try to keep him out of trouble, which he seems drawn to, especially when he is with his friend Madhav.  The son Chirag is married with two children.  The other son Gaurav does most of the caring for the elderly father.


3. Madhav has been divorced for sometime, while Janaradhan is a widower.  Madhav is more the prankster who gets them in trouble.  Gaurav is usually the one to bail them out and face the attendant embarrassment.


4. A young woman named Rose (well, Sheeka) keeps calling Gaurav, and acts like they used to know one another. Sheeka does not seem to know when to stop a practical joke; more to the point, the director does not. That and the father's hijinks move the film forward.  Somewhat.


5. Once the joke is stopped, events can move forward again.  This is sixty minutes into the film, and I don't feel more informed than I did at three minutes in.


6. After Janaradhan takes a spill and ends up in hospital with a broken leg, Gaurav and Sheeka take care of him.  This appears to be their courtship as well. That is, until Janaradhan asks her about romantic possibilities.  The problem is that she is more of an American now and he intends to stay in India.


7. At the pre-wedding party for Sheeka's friend, Janaradhan recognizes Sheeka's teacher as his old flame.  Madhav sets his hopes on her, but both Gaurav and Janaradhan think this is a rather bad idea.  The day of the wedding, Sheeka introduces her teacher to Janaradhan, and it is clear that they know one another.


8. Janaradhan cleans himself up, shaves, dyes his hair, and gets a haircut.  He looks quite different.  He goes to the college where his old flame works, but finds she's on leave.  Things go down hill from there.  He and Gaurav have a row about it later.


9. Janaradhan gets more comfortable with his younger look.  At a party it seems like a good opportunity to him and the old flame to get together.


10. Will Sheeka go back to America?  Will the old secrets be revealed?  Will Janaradhan get what he looking for?


3. Conclusions
1. The mixed acting and bloated script are mostly balanced by the cinematography and the musical numbers.
2. One line summary: Thirty minutes of comedy dissolved in a 157 minute film.
3. Three stars of five.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 10/10 Fine.


2. Sound: 7/10 Good, but hollow now and then, usually on conversation, not singing.


3. Acting: 5/10 Whereas Akshaye Khanna is a star, Paresh Rawal is a blackhole of lack.  The absence of Rawal would have improved the film greatly.  Om Puri was next to terrible to watch.  The performance of Genelia D'Souza was enjoyable.


4. Screenplay: 6/10 Too drawn out, too long, too much filler.


5. Musical Numbers: 7/10 The first musical number accompanied the opening credits and was fine. The five numbers after that were quite nice.

20131105: Bollywood Review--Aisha

Aisha

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. Indian live action feature length film, 2010, NR, 126 minutes,
2. IMDB: 4.7/10.0 from 2,098 audience ratings. Estimated budget, 140 million INR.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 'No reviews yet,' and 35% liked it from 1,600 audience ratings.
4. HuluPlus: 'Caught in the Delhi upper class world with its own set of social rules, Aisha navigates her world with a great sense of style and even greater optimism.'
5. Directed by: Rajshree Ojha.
6. Starring: Sonam Kapoor as Aisha Kapoor, Abhay Deol as Arjun Burman, Amrita Puri as Shefali Thakur, Cyrus Sahukar as Randhir Gambhir, Arunoday Singh as Dhruv Singh,  Ira Dubey as Pinky Bose, Anand Tiwari as Saurabh Lamba, Lisa Haydon as Aarti Menon.


2. Setup and Plot
1. The film opens at a wedding party for the upper crust, leaders of industry, old money, their families. The opulence is clear.  The narration proceeds from Aisha, a young woman perhaps not quite of marriageable age.  Aisha decides she's is going to be a matchmaker.  Her first project is to match the not-beauty-conscious Shefali with some suitable batchelor, say Randhir, who is well-established and thinks rather highly of himself.


2. Aisha and Pinky start the make-over of Shefali.  Arjun lets Aisha know he thinks she has gone to far.  While setting up Randhir and Shefali, Aisha encounters Dhruv, her aunt's new husband's only son.  Arjun seems a bit jealous the next morning.  Aisha and Shefali go to the animal rescue centre (ARC) where Shefali meets Saurabh, whom she seems to know and like already.  This seems out of step with Aisha's plans.


3. The whitewater camping party was a bit of a change from all the ostentatious display of wealth in the initial wedding scene, or the polo match, or the trips to the upscale clothing stores.  The single instrument, single voice musical interlude was quite nice. The music without dance was well done.  Shefali falls into the river at one point; Arjun jumps in to rescue her.


4. Aisha's interest in Dhruv and in Arjun deepens during this trip.  The presence of Arjun's friend Aarti from New York helps this along.  Randhir reveals his interest in Aisha, who is quick to discourage it, since this upsets her plans.  Shefali wonders why Randhir did not help her out of the river.  Randhir confides to Pinky that no one likes him.  He bemoans the probability of remaining a bachelor for life; Pinky says, 'join the club.'  Great stuff.  On the way back, previous events match Pinky and Randhir driving back with just each other.  Aisha goes with Dhruv after the bad scene with Randhir.


5. Back at home, Aisha decides to quit matchmaking, and tell Shefali about Randhir.  What more could possibly go wrong?  Arjun and Aisha reconnect, for a while.  Shefali reconnects with Saurabh.  The writing is on the wall, but Aisha tries to re-direct things, again.


6. Ah, another party.  Dance numbers.  Territorial stuff.  Arjun slugs Dhruv, then leaves with Aarti.  At a formal family party, Arjun brings Aarti.  Will Aisha recognize her own interest in Arjun?


7. Randhir and Pinky become engaged; Aisha is surprised that no one consulted her.  Shefali wants to get rid of everything that reminds her of Randhir.  Aisha thinks of setting up Shefali and Dhruv.  Shefali is more interested in Arjun, since he actually stepped up to save her in the river.  Shefali finally revolts against Aisha's controlling actions.  Aisha and Arjun have another falling out.


8. Dhruv and Aarti get engaged.  Aisha tells her father she's in love with Arjun.  Her father tells her he will set things up, and that she should go tell Arjun, who's at the party for Aarti and Dhruv.  What could possibly go wrong?  Quite a bit.


3. Conclusions
1. Includes elements of Clueless (1995, USA) and Emma (1996, UK, USA) with an updated Bollywood take.
2. One line summary: Would be matchmaker gets decidedly unintended results.
3. Three stars of five


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 8/10 Focus is too soft for my taste, but most of the camera work looks very good.


2. Sound: 9/10 Fine.


3. Acting: 6/10 Overly dominated by the indifferent Sonam Kapoor; fortunately, many of the good supporting actors cushion this effect.


4. Screenplay: 7/10 It's a piece about a strongly irritating personality, but it's fairly well done.


5. Musical Numbers: 6/10 There is not nearly as much dancing as usual.  Included a few moments of rap, which I could have done without.

20131104: Bollywood Review--Tere Mere Phere

Tere Mere Phere (The Open Door)

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. Indian live action feature length film, 2011, NR, 120 minutes, comedy, drama, romance.  Spoken word is Hindi, Punjabi, English; subtitles in English.
2. IMDB: 5.2/10.0 from 165 user ratings.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 'No reviews yet,' and no data through audience ratings.
4. HuluPlus: 'Tere Mere Phere is a comic look at the battle of the sexes...'
5. Directed by: Deepa Sahi.
6. Starring: Vinay Pathak as Jai Dhumal/Gollu, Riya Sen as Muskaan/Gillie, Jagrat Deshai as Rahul Bhasin, Sasha Goradia as Pooja Pahuja/Pooja R. Bhasin.


2. Setup and Plot
1. Bollywood style slapstick: we watch as plans and intentions are doomed by circumstances beyond one's control.


2. Plane is in flight.  Passengers start a row to the point where the captain returns plane to the last takeoff airport.  Of course, some people have urgent business.  We can see the disappointments coming.  Back at the airport, people are still unruly; some of those who started it decide to leave before the cops arrive.


3. The couple who started the row was Pooja and Rahul, who are married, but deeply soured on love and on marriage.  When they attempt to get away in a recreational vehicle, Jai shames them into taking him where he needs to go.  Of course, his large pistol helped enforce the shame.


4. At a rest stop, Jai encourages the warring couple to tell him how they met and the like.  Just before they first spoke, Rahul's father proclaimed, they are both too silly, who will take care of them?  Judging from this film, the man was correct.  Getting them together was a disaster from the beginning.  They did fall in lust, though, and Rahul proposed during a train ride.  It looked like he did it to get Pooja to be quiet for a moment.  The cynical younger brother of Rahul tries to talk him out of the marriage, even at two hours before the ceremony.  The flashback to the honeymoon trip was extensive; the unhappiness started even then, and the stupidity continued: destroying their cell phones, picking up hitchhikers and so on.


5. Eventually Jai starts telling Rahul and Pooja about Muskaan, his beloved, who is going to be engaged to someone else.  That's where Jai's imagined deadline comes from; he wants to stop the engagement.  They miss the deadline of course; Jai really needed the airplane from the first segment.  They change course to try to prevent Muskaan from getting married, since she's already engaged.


6. Jai asks about why they were on the plane flight in the first place.  This triggers the flashback to the disastrous end of the honeymoon.


7. Will Jai reach Muskaan in time?  Will Rahul and Pooja stay together?  Will Jai shoot both of them?


3. Conclusions
1. I have not seen adults have a mud fight in a film in a long time.  I think the last one was a Western starring John Wayne.
2. One line summary: Bickering newlyweds encounter man determined to win back his girlfriend.
3. Four stars of five.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 9/10 Slightly jumpy, but mostly fine.  The on location filming in the mountains was beautiful.  Nice plus on the credits, which were the most entertaining I've seen for quite a while.


2. Sound: 8/10 Ever so slightly tinny for conversation; rich for the musical numbers.


3. Acting: 7/10 Enjoyable once I started to embrace the silliness.


4. Screenplay: 7/10 Loved the musical numbers, but the film dragged on too long.  80 minutes might have been nice.  Too much time was spent on absurd fights.


5. Musical Numbers: 9/10 The numbers during the honeymoon trip were gorgeous.  I wish there had been more.

20131104: Bollywood Review--Aitraaz

Aitraaz

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. Indian live action feature length film, 2004, NR, 159 minutes, drama, thriller.  Spoken word is Hindi; subtitles in English.
2. IMDB: 6.4/10.0 from 2,374 audience ratings.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 'No Reviews Yet,' and 69% liked it from 1,859 audience ratings.
4. Huluplus: 'Raj Malhotra was leading a happy life with wife Priya when his ex-flame Sonia enters their life.'
5. Directed by: Abbas and Mastan Alibhai Burmawalla.
6. Starring: Akshay Kumar as Raj Malhotra, Kareena Kapoor as Priya Saxena, Priyanka Chopra as Mrs. Sonia Roy, Amrish Puri as Ranjit Roy, Annu Kapoor as Barrister Ram Chotlani.
7. Said to be a remake of Disclosure (USA, 1994). Sonia's re-entry is not a happy thing.


2. Setup and Plot
1. We start out with a mistaken address and identity.  Raj in #30 is looking for a housekeeper; Ram in #13 is looking for a legal secretary.  Priya is looking for a secretary position at a legal office.  She goes to #30 by mistake.  "I don't consider any job too small" has unexpected consequences.  Her opposite number (the housekeeper) lands the job as legal secretary.  How long can these misunderstandings last?


2. Not very long; both Ram and Raj figure it out.  Ram comes over to get some borrowed law books; his comments let Priya figure it out quickly. 


3. Love at first sight is the diagnosis; they marry and are doing well.  Priya is soon expecting.  Raj gets a promotion and buys a bungalow.  At the announcement of his promotion, Raj gets a bad surprise.  The Big Boss' wife is Sonia, his one-time girlfriend, who is also the new managing director of his company.  She announces Raj's promotion; not to CEO but to seat on the Board of Directors. The party that evening sets the stage for disasters to come.


4. The flashback description of the early days of Raj and Sonia's relationship (before they broke up) was nothing short of beautifully done, lovely and evocative.  Then she leaves him to pursue Ranjit Roy.  The transition is difficult.  Raj thought they had something; clearly Sonia did not.  Her career and ambition are everything to her.


5. Why she is angry at Raj after she marries the big boss Ranjit Roy is hard to see.  She arranges a private meeting, comes on to him; he resists, but not hard enough. Worse yet, he rejects her before anything happens.  Then she brings charges of sexual impropriety against him with her husband.  The next day Ranjit Roy demands he resign; that's just the beginning.  Raj does not resign; he goes to the office and works.  Harsher methods are brought to bear against him, including legal charges.


6. The ferocity of Sonia's attack is met by the strength of Priya's defensive energies and the loyalty of his defense team and friends.  Of course, there also turns out to be business reasons driving this mess, plus dirty tricks.


7. Who comes out the better in this horrible waste of resources, time, money, and reputation?


3. Conclusions
1. One line summary: Bollywood version of Disclosure (USA, 1994) with singing and dancing.
2. Five stars of five.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 10/10 Excellent camera work and 2.35 aspect ratio.


2. Sound: 10/10 Delightful music and singing.  No problems with conversational voice.


3. Acting: 8/10 Good.


4. Screenplay: 9/10 Well done adaptation.


5. Musical Numbers: 10/10 Beautiful, energetic, enjoyable.  The first number is about being in a quagmire, and sailing one's heart in a quagmire.  Yikes!  Sets the tone for the rest of the contentious script.  The second, third, and fourth numbers continue the high quality.

20131103: Bollywood Review--Shadow

Shadow

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. Indian live action feature length film, 129 minutes, 2009, action, crime, drama.
2. IMDB: 4.9/10.0 from 77 user ratings.  Spoken language is Telegu; English subtitles.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 'No score yet,' 0% liked it from 9 audience ratings.
4. HuluPlus:  Will Inspector Sanjana catch criminal mastermind Arjun Sherawat?
5. Directed by: Rohit Nayyar.  Screenplay by Nasser Khan.  Producer: Nasser Khan.
6. Starring: Nasser Khan as Raju/Arjun, Sulnari Kulkarni as Inspector Sanjana Singh Rajpoot, Sachin Khedekar as Home Minister Shiv Shankar, Milind Soman as Rahul Kapoor, Hrishita Bhatt as Sheetal Pradhan.


2. Setup and Plot
1. The Mumbai police take a lot of flak from the press for not catching Arjun Sherawat.


2. Inspector Sanjana is on the case.  About 60 minutes in, it seems that's she's solved it.


3. Has she? No.  So we go for a second round of detect and chase.


4. She catches up with some of his henchmen, but loses a fight and is captured.  The explanation of her release was absent.  Hmph.


5. Her father (also her superior in the Mumbai Police) assigns a senior officer for her to work with.  They shoot and arrest Arjun, who gets sent to the hospital.  While there, he implicates some high-ranking officials, including Shiv Shankar.


6. Will the police sort this out?


3. Conclusions
1. As vanity films (Nasser Khan) go, this one is on the bad side.
2. One line summary: Inspector versus criminal mastermind in Mumbai.
3. Three stars of five.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 10/10 Nice looking throughout.


2. Sound: 8/10 OK.


3. Acting: 2/10 Between poor and non-existent. 


4. Screenplay: 6/10 Moves along from beginning to end, but might have been better as a 30 minute short instead of a 129 minute feature.


5. Musical Numbers: 6/10 So-so, but they were present.

20131102: Bollywood Review--36 China Town

36 China Town

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. Indian live action feature length film, 2006, 140 minutes, comedy, mystery, thriller.  Spoken word is Hindi; English subtitles.
2. IMDB: 5.4/10.0 from 1,637 audience ratings.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 'No reviews yet,' and 70% liked it from 5,972 audience ratings.
4. HuluPlus: '...murder mystery in the Chinatown of Goa'
5. Directed by: Abbas Alibhai Burmawalla, Mastan Alibhai Burmawalla.
6. Starring: Akshaye Khanna as Chief Police Inspector Karan, Kareena Kapoor as Priya, Shahid Kapoor as Raj Malhotra, Paresh Rawal as Natwar, Upen Patel as Rocky.


2. Setup and Plot
1. From the opening in Goa, this seems to be a film about the relentlessly meaningless problems of the entitled, the rich, the decadent, and the pointless.  That is, the fat-cat parasites who live in lavish settings in the resort city of Goa, India.  Gambling seems to be one of the main tools for separating fools from their money. As the film progresses one sees other means of separating the money: exotic dancers, gigolos, corruption in the film industry, and so on.  Playboy/gigolo Rocky seems to be at the centre of everything; we'll see how long that lasts.  He seems to enjoy staying with Sonia Chang at 36 China Town, the address/name of her mansion.


2. Meanwhile, in Mumbai, Raj made a music video which a director likes.  However, he blew his savings making it, and no longer has the 1 million he needs to bribe the director to get a lead role.  Priya thought she had a boyfriend interested in marrying her.  Instead, he wants from her father a couple of million to start a business; if the business goes well, perhaps another million will lead to a marriage.


3. Priya and Raj (after a rocky start) 'adopt' a missing child in order to collect a 2.5 million reward.  They just have to travel to Goa to collect it from the child's putative mother, Mrs. Sonia Chang.  Unfortunately for them, the ultra-wealthy Sonia gets murdered 60 minutes into the film.


4. An alternate thread follows two hopeless gamblers through their ups and downs.  Major losses, good-sized wins, bad blows to family fortunes are detailed.  Sounds like possible homicide motives.


5. Priya and Raj find 36 China Town.  The lights are dim and the doors unlocked.  Bad signs?  They go in anyway.  They discover the body.  They call in the murder anonymously, but Raj gets apprehended by Inspector Karan when he goes back to the scenel.  He manages for a bit to keep Priya and the baby out of it.


6. Meanwhile, one of the gamblers finds body parts in one of his suitcases.  Great stuff.  Priya gets noticed, then arrested.  The gambler and his wife get arrested when the body parts are discovered.  Karan sorts things out.  He finds the other gambler and asks to talk to his wife as well.  Ah, the construction of lies is such a convoluted thing!  Kana arrests the second gambler as well.


7. Kana lets his seven suspects go, and tells them not to leave Chinatown's Silver Jubilee.


8. Lovely ending.  Three stars goes to four.


3. Conclusions
1. The movie is too padded on the one hand, and needs more singing and dancing on the other.  Finished well, though.
2. One line summary: Murder mystery plus comedy of errors in the gambling resort of Goa.
3. Four stars of five.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 8/10 Pleasant to the eye for the most part.  The reverse video passages seem both needless and repellant.


2. Sound: 4/10 Yikes, major problems here.  First, the subtitles are absent in passages.  Second, where they are present, they tend to be sixty or so frames lagging behind the video.  Third, conversations tend to have the hollow sound associated with badly miked actors.


3. Acting: 7/10 Reasonable.  Liked the performance of Akshaye Khanna, as I did in Aap Ki Khatir.


4. Screenplay: 7/10 Needs compression.  The story does move along, but has too much filler.


5. Musical Numbers: 7/10 Mixed bag.  The single biggest reason I watch Bollywood films is the presence of good musical numbers.  The dancing, the vibrant singing, the frequent humor, and the good-hearted silliness are a treat.  In this film, though, there is way too much use of audio filters that cancel out the quality of full frequency singing.  The filtering delivers castrated mush; the usual richness is defeated.  It's like dropping back to 1960s audio quality.  Some of the later ones were better.

20131101: Bollywood Review--Khwahish

Desire (Khwahish: The Last Wish)

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. Indian live action feature length film, 2003, 152 minutes, drama, romance, musical.
2. IMDB: 4.1/10.0 from 131 audience ratings. Spoken language Hindi, English subtitles.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 'No reviews yet...' and 33% wanted to see it from 4 audience ratings.
4. HuluPlus: 'Khwahish traces the sexy, funny and intense relationship of Amar Ranawat and Lekha from the time they met.'
5. Written and directed by: Govind Menon.
6. Starring: Himanshu Malik as Amar Ranawat, Mallika Sherawat as Lekha Khorzuvekar, Shivaji Satam as Amar's father, Mahmud Babai as Ulhas Khorzuvekar (Lekha's father).
7. Said to be a remake of 'Love Story' for the Indian audience.


2. Setup and Plot
1. Amar and Lekha meet in a clothing store where they haggle over a pajama-kurta set, where he wants the pajama and she wants the kurta.  They start spending time together while they bicker.  They have 3 months to go in university.  At graduation, they still have not made plans, but they do fall in love. Despite the wealth disparity, they decide to marry.


2. Oops.  Amar's father cuts him off.  They marry through Lekha's family.  They start out happily, but the money runs low.  Her family helps out; she does some tutoring in music.  He sells his BMW motorcycle, and tries to succeed at school.


3. Lekha gets to know Amar's mother.  By happy circumstance, they both like Rahul Dev Burman's music.  That goes rather well.  They set up a meeting, at which Amar and his father might reconcile.  Amar cancels it, and is harsh to Lekha when she tries to soften the message over the telephone.  Time goes on, and Amar graduates and gets a good (perhaps not great) job, and they move to a better place.


4. The job provides for them, which is good, but they have less time together.  They try a party, which was fun, but not enough.  Then they try to start a child.  When conception eludes them, they seek medical clarification.  Unfortunately, Lekha's been found to have a fatal disease, and will die soon.


5. Amar borrows money from his father, and takes Lekha on vacation.  They have a great time, but Lekha eventually tells Amar that she got the bad prognosis from their doctor.  They have a long, emotionally sad talk.  Lekha even found out through Amar's mother that Amar borrowed money for a problem; the two of them figured everything out.


6. The good-bye is extended.  Will Amar reconcile with his parents?


3. Conclusions
1. Re-make of Love Story (USA, 1970).  On the whole, I liked it.  Wish the acting had been a bit better, and the direction a bit tighter.
2. One line summary: Young couple of different wealth levels make it on their own, but a fatal disease intervenes.
3. Three stars of five.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 10/10 Beautifully done, in 2.35 aspect ratio.


2. Sound: 7/10 Adequate, but does not match the quality of the camera work.


3. Acting: 6/10 Liked Mallika Sherawat (Anu) and the three actors who played the parents. The supporting actors could have been better, but Himanshu Malik was the weakest link.


4. Screenplay: 7/10 Has a beginning, middle, and an end; the logical progression seemed satisfactory if overly slow.  110 minutes might have been a better running length.


5. Musical Numbers: 5/10 Definitely a weak point, both for singing quality and presentation.

20131101: Bollywood Review--Aap Ki Khatir

Aap Ki Khatir (only for your sake)

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. Indian live action feature length film 2006, romance, drama; spoken language is Hindi + some English; subtitles in English.
2. IMDB: 3.9/10.0 from 508 audience ratings.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 'No reviews yet,' and 60% liked it from 3,082 audience ratings.
4. HuluPlus: 'A woman hires an escort to make her ex-boyfriend jealous.'  Yes, it's a remake of The Wedding Date (USA, 2005).
5. Directed by: Dharmesh Darshan.  Screenplay by Sunil Munshi.
6. Starring: Sunil Shetty as Kunal P. Shah, Amisha Patel as Shirani A. Khanna, Dino Morea as Danny Grover, Akshaye Khanna as Aman Mehra, Priyanka Chopra as Anu A. Khanna, Anupam Khar as Arjun Khanna, Lilleth Dubey as Betty A. Khanna, Bhumika Singh as Nikki.


2. Setup and Plot
1. Anu is going from India to step-sister Shirani's wedding in London. In order to regain the appreciation of her ex-boyfriend Danny, she hires Aman to act as her date, just for the wedding.  Arjun (Anu's step-father) gives Aman quite a grilling about how they met, when they met, how they got to know each other.  I wonder how deeply the cover story was worked out.  Of course, many secrets will be revealed if this is anything like The Wedding Date.


2. Anu and cousin Nikki quiz Shirani about Kunal, her finance.  There are introductions all around.  Danny, the wolf in the fold, arrives late, but is an important piece in the web of inter-relationships.  Arjun bristles immediately at Danny's presence, and wants to throw him out.  This would have been more peaceful, but less truthful. Since Danny is Kunal's old friend, Betty insists that he stay and be welcomed.  There are 3 days until the wedding.


3. Fun with cricket; Anu blackmails Aman in to letting Danny have a good time, but Aman won't have it.  Odd stuff, but helps Danny and Aman get to respect each other.  That evening at a dance party, Aman sings and dances with Nikki and other women at the party.  Danny gets a bit jealous, and Shirani gets closer to telling Anu about Shirani and Danny.  Anu becomes more impressed with Aman.  Anu gets drunk, and things proceed between her and Aman, but not too far.  The next morning, Aman details new charges for services rendered, though no intimate activities.


4. On the second full day, things start out frosty between Aman and Anu, but warm up later.  Kunal's family shows up.  They are culturally more than a little bit different than Shirani's family.  Comedy ensues.  Arjun and Aman play chess, though it might as well have been fencing.  The women play cards and discuss all the relationships.  Plus there is an outdoor cookout.  Anu's friend Maya calls; Arjun picks up, and hears just enough from Maya to guess that something is fishy between Anu and Aman.  Arjun probes; Aman feints (well, lies).  Things keep getting more complicated, but people are getting cornered into telling the truth.  Danny tries to get back with Shirani; she will have none of it.  Aman walks in unintentionally, but grasps everything immediately.  Shirani and Aman talk, while Danny tries to sweet talk Anu.  Arjun and Aman finish up the day at a campfire, drinking and talking.


5. On the third day, the full wedding party has a large meal together outside in the cold. This was followed by a musical number.  Danny and Anu attempt to finish their talk afterwards.  Ah,dark truths.  Anu admits her relationship with Aman was fake, while Danny admits he had a relationship with Shirani, after Anu left the UK for India.  He came to the wedding for Shirani, and that's not working out.  Neither of them is happy. Anu is even less happy when she finds that Nikki and even Aman knew about this before she did.  Anu takes it out on Aman, since she cannot take it out on anyone else.  Oi.  She demands that he leave, and he sets about to do this.  In the evening, he's leaving with his suitcase.  Kunal begs him to stay, and gives him the key to his cottage.  Anu urges Shirani to tell Kunal the truth; Shirani and Betty counter with 'later is better.'


6. The morning of the wedding, there is a lot of jovial camaraderie.  Aman shows up, not dressed up, still prepared to leave.  He appeals to Anu to reconsider her 'get lost' imperative.  He says good-bye to Betty, who still rather likes him.  Arjun tips the balance; Anu goes to the cottage to stop Aman.  She find the money she paid Aman instead of Aman.  Shirani decides to tell Kunal, who is furious at Danny.  Aman talks Kunal off the ledge.  Kunal talks Aman into returning.


7. Perhaps this will work out?


3. Conclusions
1. One line summary: Indian woman hires man to be her boyfriend at her sister's wedding in the UK.
2. Four stars of five.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 8/10 Good, except perhaps for the blatant lip-syncing.  Still, I liked the quality of the singing/dancing numbers.


2. Sound: 9/10 Also good.


3. Acting: 6/10 What a mixed bag.  I thought Amisha Patel (Shirani), Akshaye Khanna (Aman), Anupam Khar (Arjun), and Lilleth Dubey (Betty) were quite good.  On the other hand, Sunil Shetty (Kunal), Dino Morea (Danny), and Priyanka Chopra (Anu) were uneven.


4. Screenplay: 8/10 The writing reminded me a lot of The Wedding Date, but with significant differences, of course.  Still, the story moved along well, and the exposition of motivation was fine.  The mental fencing between Aman and Arjun was quite nice.