Movie review - Fashion | Hindi Movie Reviews

Jeevi rating: 2.75/5
Punchline: rise, fall and redemption of a supermodel
Banner: UTV Motion Pictures & Bhandarkar Entertainment
Genre: Social
Cast: Priyanka Chopra, Mugdha Godse, Kangna Ranaut, Arbaaz Khan & Arjan Bajwa
Cinematography: Mahesh Limaye
Music: Salim Merchant & Sulaiman Merchant
Dialogues: Niranjan Iyengar
Art: Nitin Desai
Story - screenplay - direction: Madhur Bhandarkar
Producer: Madhur Bhandarkar, Deven Khote, Ronnie Screwvala & Zarina Mehta
Release date: 29 October 2008

Review

 

Story
Meghna Mathur (Priyanka Chopra) is a middle class girl from Chandigarh and her dream is to become a supermodel. She comes to Mumbai against the wishes of her father. She befriends a couple of girls and uses her connections to become a supermodel. She becomes overconfident and arrogant after becoming the supermodel. And her arrogance costs her vital assignments. And she is thrown out of the prime position. The rest of the story is all about how she realizes her mistake and gets back to the fashion world.

Actors:
Priyanka Chopra gave one her finest performances in the role of Meghna Mathur. Since the story of the film is about rise, fall and redemption, Priyanka has got an opportunity to go through all kinds of emotions in this film. Kangana Ranaut is cool as the fallen supermodel. You end up sympathizing for her role. Mughda Godse is excellent as the model friend of heroine. Arbaaz Khan is competent. Arjan Bajwa is pretty good. Sameer Soni impresses. Ashwin Muhran is nice as the gay friend of heroine.

Technical departments:

Story - screenplay - direction: Director Madhur Bhandarkar created a story which has emotions graph that is best suited for Hollywood films. The story appears more biographical where it concentrates on rise, fall and redemption. Madhur showcased the inside issues, the making of supermodels and the games model agencies and editors of fashion magazines play. The first half of the film is dealt decently. The pace in the second half becomes very slow and the realistic approach towards the story does not go well with viewers who go to the theaters expecting an appealing narration. He interlaced the story of three models whose lives are interconnected. The narration of the second half is not gripping enough.

Other technical departments: The theme music by Salim and Sulaiman is pretty good. Cinematography by Mahesh Limaye stands out. The use of vibrant colors enhances your viewing pleasure. Dialogues are adequate. Editing should have been crisp. Production values are superb. Artwork deserves an appreciation.

Analysis: First half of the film is adequate. The second half is little boring. Madhur Bhandarkar gives us a sneak peek into the fashion world of unethical businesses, gay designers, drugs, alcohol, smoking, sex, wardrobe malfunction, wild lifestyle and much more. But ‘Fashion’ looks like more of a personal journey through the fashion world than a movie made for a larger crowd of movie lovers. The performances and the theme are the plus points of the film. The boring second-half is the negative point. On a whole, Fashion is neither ‘Page 3’ nor ‘Corporate’.

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Zain Khan shines in fun film 'Hari Puttar' (Hindi Film Review - Rating: **)

Film: 'Hari Puttar: A Comedy Of Terrors'; Cast: Zain Khan, Swini Khara, Sarika, Lillette Dubey, Jackie Shroff, Vijay Raaz, Saurabh Shukla; Director: Lucky Kohli and Rajesh Bajaj; Rating: ** 

A child accidentally left behind alone at home tries to protect his house against two funny criminals - does this ring a bell? You guessed it right, 'Harri Puttar', which Hollywood studio Warner Bros alleged was a copyright violation of their 'Harry Potter' franchise, is also a copy of popular Hollywood movie 'Home Alone'.

While Macaulay Culkin deals with two ordinary burglars trying to break into his house, Zain Khan, who plays the title role in 'Hari Puttar', tries to stop the two criminals from entering his house.

The difference between the original and 'Hari Puttar' is that in the Hindi version the two prowlers are not eyeing valuables in the house - they are after a chip that has valuable information saved on it. Also, Hari is not alone in the house. He has his cousin Tuk Tuk (Swini Khara), who has asthma, for company - again the idea is stolen from the Jodie Foster starrer 'Panic Room' in which Jodie was cooped in a room with her daughter, who suffers from Type 1 diabetes.

Just like Macaulay, Hari too sets up the same traps using household items and befriends a scary old man who comes to his rescue in the climax.

Sarika, who plays Hari's mother, seems to be a perfect replacement for Catherine O'Hara, who played Macaulay's mom in the original. However, the actress fails to play the role as convincingly as Catherine did.

Despite being a copy, the film is entertaining, especially the second half - when Hari thwarts the two criminals' attempts to enter his house.

Vijay Raaz and Saurabh Shukla as the comic criminals are funny, but it is talented Zain who shines as the protagonist. He is as good as Macaulay.

Lillette Dubey and Jackie Shroff look like extras in the film.

Children, who have not seen 'Home Alone', will have fun watching the movie.

Set in London, the film revolves around 10-year-old Hari Prasad Dhoonda (Zain Khan) or Hari Puttar, as he is fondly called.

Hari's father (Zakir Khan) is a professor and has been assigned to work on a secret project at a remote location in Britain. So Hari moves to that country with his father and mother (Sarika).

Hari's father has access to confidential information stored on a chip and safely kept at his house.

Within days of their arrival in London, Hari's aunt (Lilette Dubey) and uncle DK (Jackie Shroff) visit them with their children. The kids of DK's boss also accompany them.

Now, accommodating so many children in the house becomes a problem. At one point everything goes for a spin for Hari - not only is he thrown out of his room, he is also ragged and ridiculed by the other kids.

He in fact wishes that all his family would simply disappear, a wish that comes true.

The film has flaws, but directors - Lucky Kohli and Rajesh Bajaj have been successful in their endeavour to elicit laughter and entertain kids with the film.

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'Saas Bahu Aur Sensex' - a good concept gone awry

Film: 'Saas Bahu Aur Sensex'; Cast: Farooque Shaikh, Kirron Kher, Tanushree Dutta, Masumeh Makhija, Lillete Dubey, Sharon Prabhakar; Director: Shona Urvashi; Rating: 3.5/5

To be fair, putting together saas-bahu sagas and the sensex seems a good concept, but director Shona Urvashi fails to use it effectively in her film.

In recent years, Bollywood has been generous to directors who experimented with novel concepts and the audiences too accepted their films. 'Saas Bahu Aur Sensex' dares to be different as it tells the story of middle-class housewives playing the stock market.

The film has its moments but not sufficient to make it engrossing fare.

'Saas Bahu Aur Sensex' is the story of a rude and insensitive Parsi stockbroker Firoze Sethna (Farooque Shaikh), divorced Binita Sen (Kirron Kher) and a group of women.

The director inter-weaves a love triangle into the main plot.

Nitya (Tanushree Dutta), Binita's daughter, shifts to Mumbai with her mother and meets Ritesh (Ankur Khanna) who helps her in getting a job at a call centre. Ritesh is in love with Kirti (Masumeh Makhija) who lives in the same society. But Kirti has other plans, she wants to marry a millionaire.

Despite the presence of the two veteran actors, Kirron and Farooque, the film fails to hold the audiences' attention. The reason being that the director fails to execute the story deftly and characters aren't properly etched.

Farooque, who had almost disappeared from the big screen, chose a wrong movie to make his comeback. As far as Kirron goes, in the recent past she has chosen all the wrong films and her talent is not utilised in this film either.

Tanushree provides the oomph content, but neither she nor Masumeh, who was in Shona's first film 'Chup Ke Se!', impress.

Others like Lillete Dubey, Sharon Prabhakar are wasted too.

In short, the film is a failed attempt to make the saas-bahu and sensex topics into a heady mix.

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