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khobor2002
Reviews
Baabul (2006)
Outrageous message in the 21st century - a woman's happiness=husband
Being out of the loop I did not know about this movie until now. I do not know what the general reaction to this movie was, can only hope it was a super flop. The point of the movie seems to be that widow remarriage is a good thing. Agreed. But this movement had started more than a century ago and I don't think exists in the upper classes in urban Mumbai (which is where the movie is based). So, the movie should have been set where this is still an issue (like the movie WATER). OK now let's allow the movie some artistic license. So, what is it that we learn from this movie? We learn that women have the right to a happy and fulfilling life even if their husbands are dead. And how are they to have this life - by getting themselves another HUSBAND!!! And that too she should not fight for her rights and demand such a thing but hope that her patriarchal father-in-law has the goodness of heart to ALLOW her to remarry. Really, is the concept of women's rights, women's own identity so alien to Bollywood? AAKHIR KYON. This was a commercial movie made in Bollywood more than 30 YEARS ago and even that talked about the importance and necessity of a woman having her own identity. Seriously, does Bollywood suffer from Collective Amnesia? I can only end with AAKHIR KYON?
21 Grams (2003)
lazy movie making
Another commenter said that the time scrambling was done to make a very boring and bad movie interesting. I absolutely agree. I could not understand why this time scrambling was essential for this movie. The other commenter's comment made me realize the reason. It seemed like the movie maker was being lazy and instead of tell the story as simply and clearly as possible (which I think is always the most difficult thing to do) he decided to incorporate a whole bunch of movie making tricks to make it look like it is a great movie. Like in an exam when you don't know the answer to the question and you use beautiful language to obfuscate that.
Guru (2007)
Even Dhirubhai couldn't have written a better autobiography
Well, Maniratnam has proved his worth as a director. To be able to make a hero out of somebody like Dhirubhai requires great skills. Not to mention that he made an excellent movie even with Ms Rai in it. (why did he cast her in that movie - did he lose a bet or was that a contractual thing for casting Mr. Bachan? Or was Tabu unavailable?) At the end of the movie the audience are most likely to come to the following conclusions: 1. Guru is a courageous, in-your-face, kind of entrepreneurial genius. 2. People such as Guru are the key to the success of our country and to the elimination of poverty 3. Guru is a hero of the poor people fighting for them against the club going, golf playing, influenced by the west, rich clique who prevented others from coming into their group with the help of the license raj, 4. People who stand up against corruption are honest, good people but really who are we kidding, do we really need these jokers? and 5. a small side issue is that the role of good women is at the side of their genius husbands even when they are treated as start-up capital. However, these are my questions: 1. If the poor are poor is it really because they are either lazy, or scared, or simply idiots. I wonder what would Mohd. Yunus of Grameen Bank have to say about this? 2. According to the movie people like Guru benefited 30 million people. In a country of 1 billion is 30million that much? It is just 0.3%. Not to mention these "poor people" had to be people who were at least of middle class status and living in cities. 3. Yes, it is true that the license raj did fetter the rise of dynamic capitalists - but will somebody ever talk about those toiling masses of this country who work until death to make this country run and people like Guru trilionaires? 4. And will someone ever say anything against making heroes of not only persons who are geniuses at exploiting others but also those who take dowry? what happened to all that social conscience of ours? It makes me very sad when talented film makers such as Maniratnam make such movies. Miracles can happen and may be Maniratnam will find his conscience....someday....