I came away pretty disappointed with the ambitious project of a film that had worked up a lot of curiosity following its promos. The inexperience of the film crew for such a project was evident from the movie length (2 ½ hours!), editing (particularly action sequences) and cinematography (too many close-ups). As for the Bunyip (incidentally an Australian myth rather than African), it turned out to be more of a ROUS (Rodent Of Unusual Size).
Better luck next time.
For a movie that’s made up holes held together by what passes for slivers of a story, I won’t bother digging deeper. However, the opening chase sequence (and most subsequent bike chases) did make me nostalgic for the video game Road Rash. If you have played it, you know what I mean, and if you haven’t here’re a few screenshots to illustrate the point.
With that out of the way, it was quite fun to see the Indian incarnation of Aquafina bottles on the meeting room tables in Chicago (US versions here). Then of course there was the climax which turned out to be a jazzed up Mountain Dew ad. Not really surprising given the starring role it played in the bonding scenes in the amusement park.
Last but not the least – “Et tu Aamir?” Then again, he has done this to help out his brother. So, if you are planning to watch or have watched Dhoom 3, recall Aamir Khan’s advice from 3 Idiots and put a hand on your heart and remind yourself “All is well”…
Those were real big bars of chocolates back in the 1960s (the movie is Dev Anand starrer Gambler). Also, this was before the Dairy Milk branding and the all purple look. 
Full song video below:
I managed to catch 5 movies over the last 3 weeks, and here are my usual views for the lot.
Krrish 3
Not much to say about Krrish 3 other than the fact that if you missed any of the Hollywood superhero movies over the last few years, then you can hope to catch quite a bit from each in the movie. And as a bonus, you get to watch the Indian ScrapIronman in the end. There’s also the fact that Bollywood has caught up with the West in terms of special effects and production values, though some of that money going into the story would have helped. Of course, this isn’t to say that I didn’t enjoy the movie, but just not in the way the film makers may have intended.
Thor 2
Pretty much typical Marvel stuff with the customary Stan Lee cameo, and the usual mid-credit teaser for the next instalment of the Marvel franchise.
Ram-Leela
This was actually my first Sanjay Leela Bhansali movie (no, I haven’t watched Khamoshi or Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam), and ended up enjoying it (a case of enjoyment being closely related to who you watch it with). Since the story is based on Romeo & Juliet, you know it all ends beforehand, so the entertainment is solely in the journey to the tragic conclusion (which in most cases would seem easy to avoid). Entertainment factor aside, the movie also had interesting depiction of mobile phones (feature phones mostly) in a rural context, including a twitter reference in keeping with the times.
Gori Tere Pyar Mein
I won’t bother trying to comment on the story, but this seems to be a movie made exclusively for an overseas audience. After all, they managed to accurately portray the iPhone model being used – a white 4\4S used in the 2011-12 flashback scenes vs an iPhone 5 used in the present day scenes. Where the film makers take you for a ride is when they try to pass off Mumbai as Bangalore. This is not Mission Impossible where you can still get away showing Kannada signs in Mumbai. To top it off, they first passed off the Mumbai airport as the Bangalore airport in the first half, and then as the Delhi airport in the second half (the Meru Cab did have a DL number plate, but there was also the Tab Cab standing next to it).
Frozen
I probably enjoyed this movie the most, and it was a throwback to the animated Disney musicals of the past. The Mickey Mouse cartoon before the movie was also quite entertaining. Overall, a fun experience that left me with a nice feeling as most animated movies do.
Ever wondered how DDLJ would’ve turned out had Rohit Shetty been the director? If, like me, you’ve watched Chennai Express, you already got your answer. A few other customary observations:
It’s not really that bad a movie as many people have made it out to be. The SRK factor probably had a large hand in shaping that opinion. Anyway, the worst movie (that I’ve watch) benchmark for me remains Tees Maar Khan.
Finally watched the movie, and here are the customary thoughts:
– Too bad the director and editors didn’t trim the movie length. They should’ve made it closer to Milkha’s 400m dash rather than a marathon.
– Farhan Akhtar has sure put in some effort, and awards are guaranteed for his performance.
– A couple of anachronisms that I noticed – the modern ceiling fan in the opening scene with Nehru and the Ambassador with a plastic bumper in the Indian contingent that goes to Pakistan.
– They had to put in the “Are you relaxing?” joke into the movie.
– The world record breaking effort is sort of ambiguous as the record was apparently bettered before he got 45.8s.
– Nice songs to round off the commercial flavour.
– Last but not the least, who cares if we didn’t get an Olympic medal as long as we managed to defeat a Pakistani. That formula has served the Indian cricket team quite well in the World Cups after all.
A few quick thoughts on the movie that I watched last Friday:
– Canon is really going all out in India given the number of photographers portrayed in recent movies, and all use Canon gear obviously
– Nice touch (intentional or not) with the Windows XP PC and Internet Explorer 6 being used by Deepika Padukone in the flashback, plus no smartphones either
– The present day of course has our hero Ranbir Kapoor using a MacBook, plus smartphones in the hands of the entire gang
– The MacBook did seem to be a tad outdated though with an older version of iTunes, but it did have Firefox installed
– The movie plot itself was pretty staple stuff as numerous reviews have noted, and Bollywood ladies as usual are a lot less sensitive to the cold as evident from their attire in the freezing Manali weather
A really close look at the evolution of the Star Wars logo and typography.
