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221 Responses to “Zila Ghaziabad, Kai Po Che, the rest of the box office”
B.O. update: ‘Kai Po Che’ starts well at plexes, ‘Zila Ghaziabad’ at single screens
By Taran Adarsh, February 22, 2013 – 14:50 IST
KAI PO CHE fetched a flying start at multiplexes of major centres. The opening shows in Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Pune, Delhi-NCR, Gurgaon, Chandigarh, Kolkata, Indore, Bhopal, Jaipur and Bangalore ranged from good to very good, with the youth thronging the plexes from the morning shows itself. The fantastic pre-release promotion by UTV, coupled with the tremendous following of writer Chetan Bhagat amongst youth, ensured impressive footfalls at major centres. The response in Punjab and U.P. was not up to the mark. Released in 1,000 screens in India, the business is expected to grow manifold towards the evening/night shows.
On the other hand, ZILA GHAZIABAD opened quite well across single screens of mass belt. Expectedly, the opening was weak at plexes, but the single screen audience, especially in U.P., gave the film a head start due to the action genre.
Kai Po Che Decent Opening Zilla Ghaziabad Dull Opening
Friday 22nd February 2013 12.30 IST
Boxofficeindia.Com Trade Network
Koi Po Che had a decent opening of around 40-45% while Zilla Ghaziabad was dull across the board with around 20% Kai Po Che was helped by good collections in the premium multiplex areas of Mumbai, Pune and Delhi NCR though some other parts of the country like UP and Punjab were low. The film had no face value but the promotion created awareness especially in the big cities where collections are much better.
Zilla Ghaziabad was dull in the morning and stands no chance at the box office as a film like Kai Po Che can improve as the day goes along but Zilla Ghaziabad being an action film has limited upside.
Both films have Hollywood release A Good Day To Die Hard for competition which also did not open well apart from a few centres in East Punjab where there is the novelty of the film being dubbed in Punjabi for the first time.
Special 26 had a decent second week of around 15 crore nett which has taken the two week business of the film to nearly 54 crore nett. The film maintained best in Delhi NCR, East Punjab and Mysore.
The film has actually found appreciation in some parts but the opening was a killer and it is tough to recover from such an opening. the final business of the film is looking in the 60-62 crore nett range which is a decent total especially considering the opening the film took.
The final total will be in same range as Khiladi 786 which grossed around 63 crore nett. That film had collected around 16 crore nett in week two.
February 21, 2013
Movie Review
Bromance, Cricket and Sectarian Riots
By RACHEL SALTZ
Abhishek Kapoor’s “Kai Po Che” takes risks, not least in its choice of subject matter. Set in Ahmedabad, this tale of three friends making their way in the new India builds up to an ugly moment in recent history: the 2002 riots in Gujarat State in which Hindu mobs attacked Muslims, killing nearly 1,000.
Ambitious but uneven, “Kai Po Che” (based on Chetan Bhagat’s novel “The Three Mistakes of My Life”) mixes, not quite successfully, traditional Bollywood storytelling with something less conventional. Perhaps that’s because it was adapted from a contemporary novel, which remains rare in commercial Hindi cinema. Also unusually, the movie doesn’t use star power to hammer home a message.
The three friends are a typically mismatched collection. Ishaan (Sushant Singh Rajput) is the handsome one, volatile and a gifted cricket player. Govind (Raj Kumar Yadav) is the nerdy numbers guy. And Omi (Amit Sadh) is … well, what is he? Not much more than a narrative necessity, a Hindu from a religious family whose uncle, ominously, is a high muck-a-muck in a nationalist political party.
With its locations in Ahmedabad, Gujarat’s largest city, and its careful references to time — the date is often flashed on screen, which for South Asian viewers, at least, is a clear marker of what’s to come — the movie sets up expectations of a certain kind of realism that it delivers only fitfully.
Mr. Kapoor too often gives the brothers-for-life theme the Bollywood treatment, including a bromantic song montage full of elegiac bonding: We’re young! We’re crazy! We jump off parapets into the green, green sea! That might work in another film, but here it takes up space, going sentimental when the story needs to go deep. Less generic is the plotline involving Ishaan’s discovery of a Muslim boy, Ali (Digvijay Deshmukh), cricket’s version of the Natural, and their complicated teacher-student relationship.
Omi is too bland for his (spoiler, I suppose) metamorphosis into a glassy-eyed, scimitar-wielding Hindu marauder to resonate. But the Ishaan-Ali story grows more interesting as the threat of violence increases, and then turns to bloodshed. (Here too the movie mixes a realistic impulse with a mythic, only-in-the-movies showdown.) And though a sudsy epilogue rings false, there’s a measure of optimism in the story’s insistence that communal barriers can be transcended, however briefly or imperfectly, through the national pastime, cricket.
I have busy working and now i am sick and on bed rest ( again !! ) but i intend to watch the movie, and hopefully looking forward to write about it. But will take few weeks to catch this movie 😦
i am little apprehensive about the media/reviews going ga-ga over KPC – don’t think that it will be a mammoth bo success unless it really turns out to be what these media people are shouting from the roof-top….
Its title derived from that cry of victory yelled out when an opponent has been defeated in a kite flying challenge, ‘Kai Po Che’ translates literally as “Gotcha!” An apt expression, perhaps, to describe the home run director Abhishek Kapoor delivers through this moving film about a friendship challenged by real-life tragedies.
It seems both the films had similar collections, 3.75 crores. KPC did better in multiplexes in mumbai circle. And ZG did better in single screens in the north.
Just put my review up now guys, KAI PO CHE is an excellent film. Still absorbing the film, and one I will certainly watch again before the year ends, but nonetheless a very important film with some stunning performance. Raj Kumar Yadav is one to watch out for. Whilst ROCK ON! left me with a “feel good” feeling at the end of movie, KAI PO CHE left a lingering effect…….PARZANIA, FIRAAQ and DEV all touched on similar themes in different ways. The last 30 minutes, whilst you know where its heading, is still brilliantly shot.
Hey maan–no ‘networking’ here !!!
This exchange of emails etc in this khan-type Satyam scenario hehe joking …
Btw wont /can’t watch this one –since not showing v near me–& I usually dont go out d the way for my films …
But–
The positive reports can’t be ignored…
And another angle that can’t/shouldn’t be
Missed is the involvement of chetan bhagat…
Haven’t /won’t read this book but how much is the book and how much is the director ..
A similar ‘debate’ I had with someone about life of pi and yann martels book…
And this also brings to focus his involvement since even in 3idiots there was this controversy which seemed to be suppressed by aamir (as usual) –rememener this ‘common theme’ from tzp with gupte, peepli with that woman etc
Ps: haven’t read any of chetan bhagat ‘novels’–(& nor would I read em)
But any input from bhagat ‘fans’ will be useful on this angle 🙂
Zilla Ghaziabad collected a poor 3.50 crore nett on day one with only single screens doing a bit better. The collections of the film were better in UP, Bihar, CP Berar, CI and Rajasthan with a lacklustre performance across all metros.
The film had a fairly wide release and as the first day recorded poor occupancies the film will struggle for growth on Saturday and if the growth does materialise it will be well short of what the film will need.
In the mass belts like UP, Bihar, CPCI and Rajasthan where Zilla Ghaziabad had comparatively better collections the collections were double of Kai Po Che but much lower than Kai Po Che in the metros especially Mumbai, Pune and Bangalore.
Kai Po Che collected a decent 3.75 crore nett on day one as it fared pretty well in metros. The collections were decent as the film had a limited release at many places and no known faces in the film.
The film did its best business in Mumbai and Mysore. The collections were decent in Delhi but that countered by the poor collections in UP, it was a similar story in East Punjab where Gurgaon was decent but the rest of the circuit poor. Central India also did not fare well.
The film should show growth on Saturday especially as the areas it is doing better in tend to have very good business on Saturday. Overall the film will depend on what sort of numbers it can get in metros over the long run.
The biggest plus is the film can do very well in Mumbai circuit as it is class appealing film so Mumbai city can score and a Gujarat setting should help in Gujarat enabling the film to have the two biggest components on Mumbai circuit on side.
this means that Dostana 2 is probably going before the Umesh Shukla film which wasn’t supposed to start before mid-year or something. This probably makes the Do aur Do Paanch deal more questionable at this point. Because it couldn’t begin before next year at the earlier. All for the good as far as I’m concerned! Of course I continue to maintain my resistance to Dostana 2! LOL, Abhishek’s putting himself in a position where neither fans like myself nor his worst detractors will get what they want out of him. The fans won’t get the serious stuff and the detractors will have to live through box office success! Man, I liked the old equation better..!
typo in my comment above on chetan bhagat—
“khap type” not ‘khan type” in thei think given the circumstances, it IS a good deal for abhi shrek! lately satyam is getting khap-ish tendencies hahaa
as for dostana 2!
with dhoom 3 and dostana 2, he has atleast one and a half sure shot box offcie winners!
He NEEDS box office ‘muscle’ to leverage his choices later on..
ps–think finally he is learning from his failures…
and learning to take charge of his career (finally)
ps2–the omg guy film still irks me—didnt mind omg but that director seemed from an older school of film making (and perhaps fit for tv serials lol)
it means Happy New year and Umesh Shuklas projects which he is doing for sure, pushed after dostana 2… i believe Junior is not doing right moves, happy new year after dostana 2 will not be a smart move, he will become Shashi Kapoor…. he need to act in Businessman OR Umesh Shuklas Project or any other solo hero project after dhoom 3 or atleast after dostana 2 not happy new year with SRK.
Only the Shukla project seems pretty sure because both the director and producer have confirmed it and have talked about completing the script over the next few months. Even here it’s not a 100% because Abhishek would otherwise have mentioned this too. On Happy New Year though no one has mentioned him in this context. The speculation seems strong but nonetheless there is no confirmation from anyone involved. My own sense following all of this is that Shukla’s film is next up after Dostana.
What is clear is that barring the obvious Dhoom he’s erring on the side of comedy in every one of his films. There are easy box office numbers here so I don’t blame him but there can be too much of a good thing. Because even the rumored films all seem to belong to this genre. I also think he’s probably not agreed to dramas at this point because there was the Dhulia rumor as well as the Ekta Kapoor one. The problem is that even if solely for commercial reasons there should be more of a mix because if you associate yourself with lighter fare you might get a lot of box office success but that too can become a mixed blessing inasmuch as the audience then might not want the more serious stuff from him at all. I suspect he’s just trying to wipe out all memory of some of the films that didn’t work because these did have him mostly in serious parts. Hence if he did serious an audience would potentially be reminded of those films and be more skeptical. Having said that comedy whether in its masala manifestation or otherwise rules the roost anyway, doesn’t take rocket science to figure this out. But it can be dangerous if indulged in too often, i.e. if one wishes to do better stuff down the line.
Three friends share same geographical space and co exist during same period, in history, but they live in their own distinctive worlds. Their worlds are products of their idiosyncratic proclivities and passions. Due to their long years of friendship and common goal to make a decent living their worlds converge into genial camaraderie. But as time passes the inherent differences in their disposition starts showing up as cracks in their bond and eventually relationship gets acrimonious. Vicissitudes of history then goads their worlds to confront each other till they find themselves on ominous discomforting crossroads.
Koi Po Che is a well crafted portrayal of their three worlds, their mutual interplay and influence of tumultuous history on the trajectory of these individuals. It generously invests in its three protagonists, builds their characters and finds befitting actors to do this job. You know them like you know your neighbour. It then weaves these three strands on a carefully tailored backdrop, delicately, into a delectable tapestry.
The movie had smell of contemporary India; both its fragrance and stench. It revolves on cricket and communalism. Both evoke strong passions but it does not ‘use’ them as movie’s selling point. They do not make the movie relevant but as they are relevant, by themselves, and punctuate the storyline, so they find place in the movie. It brings out how young, aspirational, India is willing to cut corners to fulfill its dreams and the dejection that ensue on its failure. Some of the hackneyed but pertinent issues like conflicts because of generational gap and emotive disconnect between the between traditional and modern etcetera are touched in the movie but deft handling ensures they don’t turn into a cliché.
It is reminiscent of Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi primarily because of style of novel like narrative; steady pace of events inching towards a climax with a sure footed gait. But what makes this movie stand out from the crowd it is the ability to make an unusual fiction look real, to make incredible sound authentic, to transmute unbelievable into believable.
Koi Po Che has its share of technical ‘hits and misses’ that would not go unnoticed under a well lit scanner. But I would like part with my fine tooth, analytical, proof-reader so as not to miss the forest for the trees. It is a wholesome cinematic experience not just because it tells a story worth telling but, more so, because it is story well told.
just read this line and was well worth it–“But I would like part with my fine tooth, analytical, proof-reader so as not to miss the forest for the trees.” ha
btw arpanam–are u into hardcore ‘spiritualism’ …if so would like to learn more from u….
aa,
I have had interest in spirituality since past few years and do devote devote some my quality time towards it.
Typo:” But I would like TO part with my fine tooth, analytical, proof-reader so as not to miss the forest for the trees.”
I should have proofread my review if not the movie.
Thanx arpanam
Just checked your website–some lovely divine thoughts
Can u plz summarise for us mere mortals what u learnt during these few years in spirituality
Would be more useful than a review of Kai po che–@ least for me …
Ps: I do understand its difficult to summarise that –but reading sleek thoughts on your site –I thought perhaps u could simplify things for me -perhaps … Lol
aa,
as you have pointed out it not easy to summarize a sizable body of thought. On the site the essays looks heavy because of nature of the subject is such that even a simple elucidation appears terse.Further simplification would be at cost of making it simplistic and therefore be unfair to the subject.
If you want specific clarification then you voice them in arpanam it self. In any case all the essays there are responses to queries on spirituality.
@ Arpanam sir/madam-
Many Thanx for those lovely q/a– may need to immerse in them when time is appropriate..
& Thanx to Satyam thru whom I come across lovely folks across the world 24×7– I suspect u r somewhere around UP, India but I can already feel your good (mental) vibrations here.
That’s the power of www.
Was this available earlier-no, but who can discount the presence of some other form of ‘channeling’ earlier existed and then got lost with increased ‘corruption’ of minds (& bodies)
Ps2:
Good point about issue with ‘simplification’-but I differ–I think soemtimes it IS essential to make stuff accessible & at level to other humans
Ps3: nice point oj your site about ‘those with increased reliance about their intellect..’
hahaa
Ps4: who are YOUR current favourite actors ad actresses in india/world cinema …
“This scepticism is more is in those who have unreasonable reliance on their intellect and are obstinate about accepting anything that is not perceived by the senses. They want evidence and there is none. Their egos are stubborn and somehow feel by accepting the principle they would be either irrational or servile. They want things to move in what they call as rational but the Laws of Nature don’t fall in their paradigm of rationality. ”
arpanam uncle/aunty….thanx for exposing me to such good stuff.
WIth due respect though-The basic fallacy here is that these ‘arrogant’ folks are usually taught from childhood an ‘evidence-based approach’ esp those who are taught/exposed to ‘science’.
All around we are expected to believe in ‘reality’ and infact there are real repercussions for not doing that.
So either u have the ‘blind follower’ or the ‘thinking cynic’ who are clear…The rest fall into the ‘coridoor of uncertainity’!
By creating this world of apparent ‘mysticism’, one may appear other-worldy (& holier than thou) but the absence of any visible sign/ manifestation of these ‘invisible’ aspects does ‘alienate’ such thinking from the mainstream.
In other words, there IS a need to talk in lay-man language in a conversational tone i think..
Also the need to create simpler allegorical associations that can be identified in real life.
ps–besides that, one may not find a dearth of those worshipping the likes of tarantino, even mani ratnam and other such ‘intellgent’ stuff, but folks feel a bit ‘uncomfortable’ associating with spirituality (atleast externally). These things dont appear ‘cool’.
Thats perhaps the bane of society and we all are guilty of that (more so folks like me) 🙂
ps2–i also noted how the other day there was an explosion killing many in south india. While many commented around it, only a few expressed regret about it.
Some may have missed it though…
Some are usually quite vocal about ‘human rights’ and ‘secularism’ etc otherwise
I mean, a kid who gets killed in a bomb blast–does he/she have no ‘human rights’ or ‘right to survive’.
Why this ‘selective silence’?
Also there seem some who confuse/associate ‘spirituality’ with ‘religion’..
Disclaimer-this is not a reflection on anyone but a spontaneous comment on the state we are in currently
time to get down from my (self-styled) high horse now ..and try to do some work…lol
“aa / aa95, some interesing observations, I need to spare some time from my packed Sunday/Monday to discuss them. So give me some time.Regards.”
@ arpanam uncle/aunty–
No problems, plz take your time…
btw went through a bit more of your site and can only thank u more for teaching such good things.
btw my ‘diagnosis’ is that you are a doctor–do tell me if im right.
ps–while u are at it–plz do tell me what u think is the ‘purpose of life’–know its a gross and heavy question, but i think u are well-equipped (much more than us) to tackle it in a lucid succinct manner…thanx
aa
At the outset I am not sure if this forum is appropriate to discuss such matters. I don’t follow the discussions here regularly and therefore am not aware of the scope of this blog and moderator’s philosophy. However since you raised some genuinely valid points I have responded to them:.
“btw my ‘diagnosis’ is that you are a doctor–do tell me if im right.
folks are usually taught from childhood an ‘evidence-based approach’ esp those who are taught/exposed to ‘science’.”
“This scepticism is more ….thanx for exposing me to such good stuff..”
Spot on. I am in diagnostician in allopathic medicine. But it’s not your laudable detective prowess that is that is pertinent, here, but that arpanam can find place among those category of folks with ‘evidence-based approach’. As any diagnosis in allopathic medicine should based on evidence and be devoid of any speculative reasoning.
However evidence is modern science is based primarily on two modalities: perception and inference. Various branches of Indian philosophy viz. Sankhya, Vedanta, Nyaya, Bhuddhism etc increases the number of modalities and there relative emphasis therefore its concussion about reality differ. The quote that had elicited your response was provided to a Buddhist and to drive home a point regarding there inability to comprehend Vedic epistemology.
“By creating this world of apparent ‘mysticism’, one may appear other-worldy (& holier than thou) but the absence of any visible sign/ manifestation of these ‘invisible’ aspects does ‘alienate’ such thinking from the mainstream.”
All around we are expected to believe in ‘reality’ and infact there are real repercussions for not doing that.
Also the need to create simpler allegorical associations that can be identified in real life.”
World is perceived by the senses and through the intellect its nature is ascertained. That is evidence based rational thinking. If something exists that can be perceived by the senses then it would be speculative conclude anything about it in absence of any visible signs. There is no question of alienation here . This is transactional reality.
Now the experience of you existence is self evident. It is not dependent on your senses nor on you thinking for validation. However when someone doen’t see this simple fact and validate you existence in conjugation with things that are evident thru the senses, or say silly things like “I think therefore I exist”, he makes an error. To correct this error there is place if thinking in spirituality. On correction of this error, the reality of everything that is perceived through senses, though we are expected to believe it’s true, still stands negated. Negated as a fact, because it was negatable not because I wish to it be so. This is ontological reality.
When transactional is mixed with ontological mysticism and other worldly theories crop up which fail to stand logical scrutiny. This happens especially when people create simplified allegorical associations. Yes this has its set of repercussions, grave repercussions. IMHO most of the havoc that religion has leased is partly because of this simplification done of various religious texts by their interlocutor.
“issue with ‘simplification’-but I differ–I think sometimes it IS essential to make stuff accessible & at level to other humans”
In other words, there IS a need to talk in lay-man language in a conversational tone i think..”
Yes even the highly profound thoughts should be voiced in simplest of the language and style. As the purpose of saying anything is for the other to understand. However when the profundity is compromised to make it accessible to ‘other’ humans there is grave risk of misinterpretation. When the issue is complex the language invariably gets terse and there is risk of non comprehension. Later is less perilous than the former. Non comprehension there is acceptance of the deficit and thereby a regular attempt ensues to get at the bottom of the matter. In misinterpretation one is complacent of his error as he thinks he has understood the subject. And for correct learning he has to go through twofold process, viz, unlearning and relearning.
I would provide an illustration to validate my point. Various website that give simplified version of medical science, every second person, on click of button, is able to access and have an opinion about his medical problem. As a diagnostician I find it lot more easy to convince the diagnosis of the medical problem, to a computer illiterate than to those alec smart, who have gained some information and worse, are confident about their conclusions.
Try making it lucid it ceases to be what it inherently is. How many physicists, leave alone scientists, can comprehend some of Einstein’s laws of relativity? And how many Khyaal gayaks, leave alone musicians, can appreciate Dhrupad? Making them simplified then they may be able to comprehend and appreciate something but what they appreciate would not be Einstein’ law of Dhrupad.
This may sound elitist but I say this with utter humility that only a small section of humanity can come upon true vision of what is indicated through spiritual pointers.
So either u have the ‘blind follower’ or the ‘thinking cynic’ who are clear…The rest fall into the ‘coridoor of uncertainity’!
At the core of this problem is how belief /faith is understood. Belief is not is at contradiction with rational thinking. Rather it finds place where an experience cannot be comprehended by use of logic. It also provides an opportunity to eventually comprehend what may not be comprehendible right now. By accepting a possibility, one can pursue the possibility, till it gets verifiable, experientially.
Therefore, belief is not blind. The reason why thinking mind gets cynical is because one does not permit any other explanation that can throw light on their seemingly contradictory experiential understanding. So true clarity can dawn on those that fall in “corridors of uncertainty” remain humble, till they know the distinct place of belief and reason, in scheme of things.
“besides that, one may not find a dearth of those worshipping the likes of tarantino,”
Very true, man is essentially and believer / follower. What he/she worships is what differs but not the fact of worshipping. Either it is pulp fiction or divine fiction. True sceptics and unswerving believers are rare, majority oscillates between the two as per convenience. And it is this rare soul that can crack the mystery of creation.
“also noted how the other day there was an explosion
Why this ‘selective silence’?”
I could not figure out how was this relevant to this discussion. Anyway I can find no reason (Afzal etc) for not finding this heinous act, deplorable. I had voiced my dissent at an appropriate forum.
“Also there seem some who confuse/associate ‘spirituality’ with ‘religion’”
Though the definition of these two terms and their connotation are not well defined, however going with the conventional meaning, they are distinct pursuits. And there is always a possibility for this confusion of this to happen. Association between the two is extremely complex and its elucidation is beyond the scope of this discussion.
“while u are at it–plz do tell me what u think is the ‘purpose of life’ in a lucid succinct manner”
Completely eradicate any sense of incompleteness with its ramification (sorrow, fear, conflict etc) that one invariably experiences. Imputing any other purpose to life is error .Though every soul works towards it , knowing and unknowingly, most do it the wrong way , primarily by seeking short lived gratification and the fundamental problem remains unresolved .
“who are YOUR current favourite actors ad actresses in india/world cinema …”
I can’t put my finger on one or few who have been consistently good actor/actress. One reason is that most actors don’t exercise discretion in choosing the roles and it gets tough to differentiate a good actor’s acting abilities in bad role. As a director I find Dibakar Banerjee brilliant. I in my reckoning he stands out. All the four films he has directed viz KKG,OLLO,LSD and Shangai were consistently good. LSD, however, was exceptionally good.
MCQ “Arpanam is : uncle/aunty/sir/madam”
To reduce your options: arpanam’s chromosomal status is 46XY; so that rules out two. His biological age is 38 yrs. You can compute temporal parallax, vis-à-vis your age , match it in your culturally tinged ready reckoner, and come up with a scientific, evidence based nomenclature.
aa, now that you have, by your incredible diagnostics, and have spilled the beans and brought it in open, the most well kept secret, that arpanam is a doctor. Arpnam Uncle will take the liberty of giving you a medical tip; there is some nutritive value in what arpanam has said, which can nourish you, if you chew and not regurgitate, after it is consumed. It’s possible that you may have further question. However I will not engage into dialectics, any further, as over the years , I have realised how unproductive is polemics. Dialogue is different ball game and cannot take place on web based forums. If your questions are backed with genuine yearning and not mere intellectual curiosity, you will find appropriate answers.
Yo arpanam -that’s a nice delicious comment-firstly hope u had a comfy sun:mon Oncall
Will read this properly later
Though it doesn’t seem so-I also do some work and am bl..dy stuck in some deluge
Will be bak
Arpanam uncle (u r not that older but ‘wisdom’ wise still deserve that epithet lol)
I’m too ‘spent’ rite now and will get bak to this ‘serious’ topic at an apt time.
At the mo-my minds numb n tired –only ‘basal’ thoughts ok
Btw noted u seem obsessed with dibaker -who has yet to make a non-Delhi environ film work…Who are the heroines u like ?
Ps: like your answer on the ‘purpose of life’ and will read properly later.
As of now..
Saw Kai Po Che last night and absolutely loved it. Will try and watch it again sometime next week. Really liked this and personally prefer this to 3I. Do not miss this one guys
One of my favourite actors from the new breed, Rajkumar Yadav has come up with a crackling performance. And this is Amit Trivedi’s best soundtrack since Udaan. The BGM by Hitesh Sonik is remarkable
Kai Po Che has registered massive growth in collections on Saturday at the box office. It has collected around 6 crore nett all India on Saturday as per estimates. Kai Po Che has registered a growth of around 40-45% on Saturday from Friday. Jump is huge because Kai Po Che already had a very good Friday. Kai Po Che Two days collection now stands at 10.25 crore nett.
Kai Po Che should show again huge jump on Sunday specially in metro centers. Film is released in around 900 screens all India. On Saturday it registered an occupancy of around 70% which is big considering film has no significant star. Kai Po Che is heading for a big weekend and huge Hit at the box office.
The true triumph of a film is how it makes you feel, when you leave, when you look back at it and when it refuses to leave you long after you’ve seen it.
Kai Po Che will leave you choked and feeling good. It will leave you bittersweet. And breathless.
Kai Po Che showed good growth on Saturday as it collected around 5.50 crore nett taking the two day total to around 9.50 crore nett. The film showed huge 80-100% jumps across all metros though in other areas the jump was less at 20-30%. the film should show good growth again and gross 16 crore nett plus over the weekend.
Zilla Ghaziabad went down on Saturday grossing in the 2.75-3 crore nett range giving it a two day total of 6.25-6.50 crore nett. the film was down practically all over India with some places down by 30%. The weekend will around 10 crore nett for Zilla Ghaziabad as Sunday will not be much more than Friday.
“Lincoln is going in my second slot; it’s a bore, but it’s Spielberg, it’s well-meaning, and it’s important. Zero Dark Thirty is my No 1.”
hahaha…….inside the twisted mind of an oscar voter. confirms evertything i always suspected about oscars but he still sounds less senile than i imagine most of these cinema uncles to be. http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/race/oscar-voters-brutally-honest-ballot-422546
I have been noticing this a lot that people (mostly in the West but sometimes even in India) think that they are being very smart when they make fun of Spielberg and De Palma. Some of these folks make such idiotic comments that the likes of Tarantino and Bigelow are better than them. God help such folks
the newer filmmakers don’t have enough of a body of work to make such judgments, only time will tell. spielberg on the other hand, despite being iconic in many ways and achieving technical brilliance, hasn’t made a ‘great’ film since close encounters of the third kind. his only great film in my opinion.
if people kept worshipping at his feet without giving new talent their due, things will get stale. at some point, even spielberg can’t rest on his laurels and people move on. he is already doing a lot of good tv work with hanks and branching out. i think that’s smart.
Antya, quite frankly I am stunned that you do not find Raiders, Schindler’s List Jurassic Park and SPR as great films. It’s not a question of personal choice here- these films are considered as ‘great films’ by all reputed magazines, critics and institutes.
On the other hand till now Tarantino has made only one great film- Pulp Fiction.
Oh and I forgot to add E.T. to the list. Do think you are right that he has not made a great film since SPR though Lincoln may become one. Among his works from the past 10 yrs or so, the one I like the most is Munich followed by Minority Report and Tintin
who considers jurassic park a great film? they need their head examined, i could help them. these are big, well-done blockbusters. good entertaining films, yes. but great? i’d rate jaws above those actually. and i fu***ng hate ET.
i liked munich.
tarantino has made no great films. a bunch of really entertaining exciting films that push the envelope and have repeat value for me. i have never been tempted to watch a spielberg film twice, except close encounters. and he hasn’t made anything worthwhile lately.
hahaha anya u made my day.
‘django unchained’ as ‘tarantino masturbating’ 🙂
and ‘argo’ as a ‘whole lot of nothing’!!!
exactly right…(thats y never felt like catching afflecks much delayed ‘coming of age’ deals)
anyhow–agree theres a lot of ‘politicising’ & ‘posturing’ in these choices (both domestic n international)–& the ‘old boys club’ deal!
uve reminded me–isnt the awards today? heck–who all are checking it!
so any final guesses satyam and others-
best film, director, actor, actress….(what dya think folks)
ps–not lookin 4warward to seth macfarlane..isnt he the damn host?
yes, the awards are tonight, will be watching. mostly for the fashions, faux pas’s (non existent plural!) and most of all seth macfarlane. i hope he doesn’t sanitize it too much and makes fun of this self-congratulatory crowd.
ha but seems i will have to miss it–will be stuck in some mates’ party! may try to catch bits but seems difficult
anya–plz do give a juicy update …thanx
as for the results– DDL seems a surety. For those like bradley cooper & jen lawrence, nomination IS the award..lol
as for the ‘fashion’-
heck–just saw the ‘blue rinse’ hairstyle of kelly osborne–yuck..
“I rule out Christoph Waltz because this is a fake nomination — he’s a co-lead with Jamie Foxx, and it’s unfair for the others to compete with that. Also, much of his performance is just like in Inglourious Basterds. Robert De Niro was just Robert De Niro; yes, he had one crying scene, but crying is not enough.”
hahaha ROFL
ps-btw they HAVE TO give it to chastain –JUST bcos she reminded me of my mom in tree of life—THATS it!!
i watched the telugu film “Eega” (dubbed in hindi as makhkhi) – thoroughly entertaining and if you see its b.o. record – well it can give a run for money to any superhit bw film…check this:
Eaga First Day Collection All over India Approx- 11 Crores
rangan’s review on eega was a delight…..most of the country’s leading critics have given 3 or higher to this movie – i simply enjoyed it – expected nothing out of it….really sudeep is a fantastic actor – i wonder why he hasn’t entered bw yet?
Bollywood generally does not encourage male artists from south. At the most they get secondary roles and disappear after a while. Even if they speak the language well. It is better they do good roles in their own states than to do insignificant roles in BW. The same way BW stars are sidelined in Hollywood.
I am so glad that you liked Eega. The film really needs more patronage. And Rangan was characteristically fantastic in his review
On Sudeep, he was quite the showstealer in RGV’s Rann. And he was there in Phoonk as well as RC
Saw ‘Kai Po Che’ this morning. A very impressive film. Up there among the best male bonding Indian films ever: Dil Chataq Hai, 3 Idiots, Rang De Basanti, Rock On, Zindagi Na MIlega Dobara… and in some ways marks a natural progression from all the films that came before it. It is such a perfectly realized film that its merits are there for all to see: a masterly control in storytelling bringing out the nuances of the three characters with clarity and subtlety, the treatment of politically sensitive issues of communal tension and political expediency with maturity and restraint without avoiding them, the great use of music, and finally the brilliant casting and performances by the three protagonists.
What impressed me most , and rate it above the other male-bonding films mentioned, is that the story here is told with all seriousness without resorting to gags-laden jokey style or the fantasy or outlandish devices like in 3 Idiots or ZNMD that are used to make those films more accessible. The happenings here even when dramatic are entirely plausible and possible in the contexts they happen. The film is refreshing in its natural storytelling and so many scenes stand out for masterly staging. I especially loved the Govind and Vidya track… the depiction of their romance rates up there along with the one in Cocktail as among the most perceptive in recent times. Chetan Bhagat writes sex well…without prudery prurience. His male and female characters treat sex as a natural part of their relationship, without awkwardness or guilt, with passion and tenderness. I was most angry with Hirani for making the relationship between Rancho and Priya all vegetarian and cutting out the funny yet natural making-out scene between the two ending with Rancho ( actually Ryan in the book) escaping in the professors shirt …it was so hilarious! The lovemaking scene here built up from the lyrical Pari Hoon Mein dandiya sequence, and the aftermath of tension-filled talk in the auto to the message delivered on mixed up cellphone were very charming. Thank god there was no Mani Ratnam style attempt at elaborately choreographed dances ( The Dandiya sequence offered such a low hanging fruit of an excuse) . But the songs by Amit Trivedi are top class and are integrated very well into the narrative.
Everyone is gushing about Sushnat Singf Rajput and he WAS good. But it is Raj Kumar Yadav whose character and performance were the more nuanced . There is not much happening here in way of ‘story’ and thank god for that again – no outlandish twists and turns. What takes home from the film is a great tale f human relationship involving relatable characters , encrusted with many moving sequences. A film like this delivers the message on the futility and tragedy of aggressive communalism far more effectively than a Perzania or any of the other more explicitly political film do. For me the other high point was the relationship between Ishann and Ali, the kind of which s rarely seen in a Hindi film.
And yes, the film doe send with a stylish sign off that is so crisp, smart and elegant that many of our more celebrated directors could as well learn from it. So happy that the faith I had in Abhishek Kapoor after Rock On has been so grandly validated.
@ Utkal uncle—thanx for this take.
This is the first review of this film i have read (or will read now!) since it comes from u. I ‘value’ your reviews since they come ‘rinsed’ with your ‘experience’ & ‘wisdom’ …
“without resorting to gags-laden jokey style or the fantasy or outlandish devices like in 3 Idiots or ZNMD”–haha *though i didnt mind either or em
.
“the depiction of their romance rates up there along with the one in Cocktail as among the most perceptive in recent times. Chetan Bhagat writes sex well…without prudery prurience. His male and female characters treat sex as a natural part of their relationship, without awkwardness or guilt, with passion and tenderness.”
–good point about ‘cocktail’ & the ‘perceptive romance’ and full marx to the apt use of the term ‘prudery prurience’ here haha
The problem is 3i was also the ‘heroine’ and so it HAD to kept ‘vegetarian’…lol
finally –“Thank god there was no Mani Ratnam style attempt at elaborately choreographed dances ( The Dandiya sequence offered such a low hanging fruit of an excuse)”–hahaha
ps—with this film, it seems that bhagat DOES have a sense of the ‘pulse’ of the contemporary indian populace though he may not be great shakes as a writer. Those who have read his books maybe better judges…( i havent/wont but think credit is due)
Disappointed with KAI PO CHE..I JUST do not understand this lionization of Hindi movies that are even SLIGHTLY better than run-of-the-mill movies..
I think I will need to get my head examined because I am just not able to understand this media-orgasm — even Utkal here — about this movie..The movie is good..but the way it is being talked about..it is as though it is the next LAWRENCE OF ARABIA..
an jo: frankly i’m very happy to read your comments eventhough i haven’t seent he movie yet! I really don’t have that gut-feeling abt this media’s “masterpiece has arrived” kind of praise for this film and finally there is someone who writes this – well i may change my opinion after i watch the movie and also satyam / gf / rooney (amdavadi lawyer 🙂 ) / Q and other respected members of this blog writes their views. Not to take away anything from other respected members who have written positive reviews abt the film – but i m little put-off when people are saying that it is better than 3i/dch etc. is it really that great? if yes – good for hindi cinema.
Dont worry. 3I,DCH,RDB have something that these films dont have. That something makes all the difference. 2 weeks back it was Special Chabbis which was the best film and now it is KPC and tomorrow they will forget these 2 and start going gaga over Nawajuddin or Rajkumar Yadav or Vidya film. Just watch the fun.
AA: ” “without resorting to gags-laden jokey style or the fantasy or outlandish devices like in 3 Idiots or ZNMD”–haha *though i didnt mind either or em” I didn’t mind them either. In fact I loved these elements hugely. What I am saying is that in the context of Bollywood tradition and the popcorn munching multiplex audiences, holding that attention of the crowd without these crutches is creditable.
An Jo: ‘ it is as though it is the next LAWRENCE OF ARABIA..” No one is saying it is Lawrence of Arabia. The most that I haves aid is that ‘ it is up there with the best of male bonding movies that we have had.”
“holding that attention of the crowd without these crutches is creditable.”—
Agree with that, utkal uncle
If the film has done what u are saying it has, it is certainly creditable indeed
Ps: so u r saying this is better than 3i, znmd& even DCH– hmmm..
I saw some of these much hyped movies like Vicky Donor, Dhobi Ghat, Kahaani, English Vinglish, OMG, PST,GOW and fortunately missed Delhi Belly. The way they were hyped, I thought they will run forever in the theatres. But they folded up after 2 weeks! The hype for Special 26 was unbelievable. Maybe after watching crap movies, something reasonable makes these critics go gaga. It is a relative thing. The fact is our films do not have universal appeal in the real sense. We think we are the best and the big bad world does not recognise us. For us it is fine and we should be content with it. We thought Lagaan was the best and when it did not win, it was funny to notice the collective sigh of unhappiness in some quarters and happiness in some other quarters. And sending Barfi in a hurry without even considering other films and facing flak of its being heavily plagiarised.
“I thought they will run forever in the theatres. But they folded up after 2 weeks” films like Kahaani, Vicky donor, English Vinglish, OMG, Barfi had among the longest runs in recent years. That’s how they got to the kind of totals they got, starting with relatively low opening.
I did not include Barfi which is a clean hit.
English Vinglish was such an ordinary movie hyped to the heavens. And its returns were also not that great for all that hype.
English Vinglish was among the most subtle and perfectly crafted stories in recent times, posturing small nuances that make human relationships so fascinating. Sridevi gave a bravura performance, one of the best by an actress in recent times. and it was hugely successful for the makers with the entire cost b being recovered from the non-theatrical revenues.
I did not include Barfi which is a clean hit.
Films like Kahaani and Vicky Donor are clean ‘ super hits.’ And I thought we were talking about how good the good films are, and not about they being clean or unclean hits!
The hype is not only about how good these films are but also hinted at huge bo success,
English Vinglish is nothing but a tv soap opera like balika vadhu. As if human relationships were never portrayed like this. Remember Anuradha, Charulata, Anubhav etc.
How would u rank these films (in the same bracket)-Thanx
Another point is that kpc seems an official remake whilst 3i wasnt
There were murmurs of discontent there by bhagat –how much of there two films were the book..
Well, KPC is more or less faithful to the book apart from the last act and the climax. Bhagat himself has written the screenplay. In any case 3 Mistakes of My Life is the only Bhagat book I have liked somewhat
Hmm then bhagat deserves LOT of credit
Also I have suspected that the ‘loose changes’ in 3i were
perhaps mainly to avoid sharin official credit with poor bhagat
This has been a common theme with aamir though after gupte, peepli
In dhobi ghat he couldn’t do this bcos of trouble @ home lol
Ps; havent read any bhagat novels
Ott–
An not intouch but saw a headline
MSDs double century after a crap start
That’s what I like about the guy
Average talent, above average application and superlative ‘heart’& guts!
Why to bring aamir everywhere? It is Hirani who did not want to share credit. Because he gave credit elsewhere and he modified the script with another writer. Which Chetan could not take it. Chetam’s hello did dismally and even KPC is not such a big shake at the BO.
Chetan knew all these facts and yet he wanted to go ahead and cry foul.
Only oldgold type will twist factors like this to discredit aamir and now my doubts have been confirmed.
Kai Po Che grossed around 15.75 crore nett over its first weeeknd. The film had a pretty good start in metros on Friday and consolidated in these areas on Saturday and Sunday. Business outside the metros did pick up but as start was low the overall business also remained low. The approx breakdowns were 3.75 crore nett on Friday, 5.50 crore nett on Saturday and 6.50 crore nett on Sunday.
The weekend business of the film was similar to another non cast film ABCD – Anybody Can Dance released a few weeks back and the trend was also the same with Mumbai and South faring better but not quite to the extent of that film which was very lop sided.
The film grossed around 7.25 crore nett in Mumbai, 3.15 crore nett in Delhi/UP, 1.10 crore nett in East Punjab and 1.20 crore nett in Mysore.
Zilla Ghaziabad grossed around 10 crore nett over its first weekend. The film had an average start at some single screens but could not hold these collections over the weekend. The multiplexes were dull at most places.
The film has little chance for even reasonable overall business as the weekend is too low for such a film. UP, Bihar, Rajasthan fared best for the film. The film grossed 3.75 crore nett in Mumbai, 2.15 crore nett in Delhi/UP, 65 lakhs nett in East Punjab and 80 lakhs nett in Rajasthan.
The film which is a 35-37 crore investment may not even collect a 10 crore all India distributor share from domestic theatrical collections.
aa95: “How would u rank these films (in the same bracket)…..–how much of there two films were the book..”
I would rate 3 Idiots higher than the rest for its tremendous inventiveness and great sense of humour that it delivers without losing the soul and the core message. And it is such a difficult subject to convey on film : the right attitude to education. Whoever thought one can make a blockbuster movie based on a theme lie that. Mind you right from the first sequence on the rooftop to the last sequence in Bhutan, and all the conflicts between Prof Viru and silencer on one hand and Ryan on the other is on this core issue and not something extraneous . A remarkable achievement indeed!
Next would be Dil Chahta Hai, Rang De Basanti , Rock On and Kai Po Che, all at the same level.
DCH for its remarkably youthful language and jaunty syntax. A great portrait of friendship between 3 very interesting characters with well-etched differences in attitude to life an d choice of female mates. Great Music.
RDB for its grand and ennobling theme. Again a very inventive script. A lot of soul and tremendous energy. Unformulaic narration. No standard romance track. Very creative use of music. A truly stirring film-viewing experience.
Rock On..for treating another subject that has never been handled at this level of seriousness…a musiuc band. The four characters again are very well-nuanced individuals. The process of music-making is believable and the sings rock. But what makes the film special, as always, is the human relationship drawn out of real life, lived in experiences, rather than filmy cliché. (The scene with Sahana Goswamy’s hand smelling of fish, her confrontation with Farhan over Arjun not being able to play..etc) . And the rousing climax concert is an all-out winner.
Kai Po Che..I have already put down why it works for me.
And ZNMD comes way below. Gerwat-looking film. Very urban humour. But a little less-rooted for my liking. And it is the film that has stayed in my mind the least.
Jai Po Che is quite faithful to the book. Only the film has improved it with more sophistication. Better filmmaking replacing the clunky writing. But the characters, the situations and the essential concerns are all in the Bhagat ‘s novel.
With 3 Idiots the departure in terms of the narrative is substantial. The whole Ranchod track is Hirani-Joshi invention. AS is the childbirth woth vacuum cleaner episode. And as are many gags including the brilliant Balatakar-Chamatakar speech. But here gain Bhagat’s contribution is substantial. The films could touch hearts because of the rootedness of the three characters and the middleclass background of Madhavan and Shraman. This as well as the central conflict are Bhagat’s creation. The character of Prof Viru, the business of his son’s suicide, the key narrative crux of stealing the question papers and being found out..are all there in Bhagat’s novel. Hirani has been unfair to Bhagat..Aamir does not have much to do with this. I have a feeling Hirani was uncharacteristically mean because he wanted to ensure that Joshi got enough credit for his contribution. Anyway I was not happy with his attitude in the whole episode. Saying that the novel was only 10% of the film was a blatant dishonest statement. But thanks to Bhagat’s protests through the press people got to know what is what. And now he ahs got a kind of comeuppance with a film that many may consider superior to 3 Idiots.
Thanx utkal uncle –lovely summation there –
I always discover something new from your comments..
I suspect u must be a ‘Casanova’ in your times eh-your ‘experience’ shows
I know they arent the greatest films but have a special liking for DCH and znmd (yeah the much maligned znmd!)
3idiots was a well packaged assembled dish adeptly garnished with key elements over a robust skeleton screenplay
Rock on was easily the weakest of these –though loved the rock group element
@ sanju–“Only oldgold type will twist factors like this to discredit aamir and now my doubts have been confirmed”
Haha what ‘doubts’?-lol a lovely imagination u hav!
So are u feeling now that I have become (or am )Oldgold!!
Earlier, u were suspecting I’m the same as anya ?
Wow –btw what’s that Hindi saying –
” do(teen) badan ek jaan” ha?
Ps: having said, barring all the jokes–Ive realised that my ‘entering’ and ‘becoming’ all these ‘females bodies’ is an interesting thought.
Just imagine the ‘potential’–what all I can do/explore… Hmm 🙂
Ka Poi Che held up strongly on Monday as it collected around 3 crore nett which is 20% less than Friday. The circuits which did not open well recorded similar or ever better collections on Monday than Friday while the multiplex dominated metros were lower than Friday by 25-30%.
The four day business is around 19 crore nett and the week should finish around 26 crore nett which would be a decent total for the film and if the weekdays show good trending, it is likely to put up a good second week figure.
The overall business of the film will be best in circuits which have high multiplex contribution like Mumbai, Mysore and West Bengal. The other multiplex dominated circuits like Delhi/UP and East Punjab will be lower as the film opened poorly in these circuits.
OTT. Sanjay Leela Bhansali entered into the tv world with Saraswatichandra, a syrupy tale. It is telecast to give competition to the very popular SSLK on Zee. This SSLK’s driving force is an actress called Roopal Tyagi who shot for Fauji 2 for Red chillies which was folded up for various reasons. This girl is such a good actress and dancer and maybe the next entry into Bollywood.
Tv soaps are flourishing like never before and bollywood personalities are eyeing this lucrative market. Can they succeed where one wrong step will affect trps? With remote in hand, the viewer is the king.
Ka Poi Che held up strongly on Monday as it collected around 3 crore nett which is 20% less than Friday. The circuits which did not open well recorded similar or ever better collections on Monday than Friday while the multiplex dominated metros were lower than Friday by 25-30%.
The four day business is around 19 crore nett and the week should finish around 26 crore nett which would be a decent total for the film and if the weekdays show good trending, it is likely to put up a good second week figure.
The overall business of the film will be best in circuits which have high multiplex contribution like Mumbai, Mysore and West Bengal. The other multiplex dominated circuits like Delhi/UP and East Punjab will be lower as the film opened poorly in these circuits.
Zilla Ghaziabad grossed around 1.75 crore nett on Monday and the drop was 50% on Monday than Friday as single screens in some areas showed good collections.
But despite the film being fairly steady on Monday the 1.75 crore nett figure is a low figure for Monday. The four day business of the film is around 11.75 crore nett and the week should finish at around 15.50 crore nett which is not impressive.
The single screens in UP are best performing due to film having been set in the locality. The collections on Monday at UP single screens were similar to Friday.
rooney – that is not the point here – the way media went OTT over this made it look like a 100 cr would be done on the first weekend itself 🙂 talking abt. newcomers – even KJo’s SOTY did more than 50 cr i guess – but i am not comparing two films here mind it. Just that something was not ok with all that praise – at-least the paying public hasn’t showed that kind of enthu. unless it picks up now on……..
i have strengthened my belief that stars like aamir can make such films reach to wider audience – not to take away anything from the newcomers. Newcomers any way are having a gala time in BW at present – KPC/SOTY are two examples. Ranveer/Rajiv K/Randip hooda are also having some good solo films on hands…….regulars like AK/SRK/SALLU/AD/Sunny/Akki/Sanju/HR are also having good films on hands……abhay/irfaan/nawaz/farhaan/ they are all doing many films – so lets say bw is having many options now as far as male leads are concerned – any one left out? yeah – Emraan Hashmi – he is again having some plum films on hands then Abhi has suddenly found B.O. goddess smiling at him and he is having some fantastic films on hand…….who else? I think BW had never had so many options in the past…….Imraan Khan and Ranbir K shd have been mentioned at the top here 🙂 Saif baba doesn’t show any signs of slowing down………Oh my God! 25 solo heroes on the circuit……….simultaneously…..
There are two ways of looking at this. If critics dont give 4 stars and say it is flawless film, then the multiplex audience wont patronise these films. So critics do a charity and they forget they are critics while reviewing these types of films. After watching some will love the film and some will feel cheated. Single screens cant be influenced but the multiplex crowd can be manipulated.
Even if this film has stars, it wont get crowds in Dabangg style. The story is a bit pseudo intellectual beyond singlescreen’s reach.
It is a win win situation for the newcomers and I hope all the 3 actors will get more films including some masala ones. Among the 3, Amit Sadh has typical bollywood hero looks.
500 days of summer anyone? for all that juxtaposed drawings of NYC??
this is going to be a treat..both the leads with wonderful English accents..sunny paaji is living the perfect american dream..din kabhi yaad nahin..raat kabhi bhula nahin with multiple partners eh??
must say for 55, sunny is looking very good and youngish..
hahaha just the title made me laugh–“Singh Sahab The Great’
hail…!
ps–actually folks–liked him in ghayal,arjun,
and hey, even the infamous handpump uprooting scene in gadar
ps–oh anya–great timing –we logged in 2gether oops
now sanju will alledge we are the same person–or that i have ‘entered’ u or something like that 🙂
I always have time for Sunny in this mould and avtar. Granted, his absolute prime Boxoffice days are nowhere near what they used to be, however one simply couldn’t argue that Sunny Deol in a Anil Sharma film, in a GADAR-esque mould will deliver HUGE returns at the boxoffice from the North alone….
Hindi films that never got made..I moan the Kamal Haasan-AB one, also DEVAA, coz SG was at a good peak during the ’80s, , and the MUKUL ANAND directed DUS..
Naseer has 30 unreleased films!! and one by Mrinal Sen! What a crime..
The KH – AB Sr one, as far as I know, was an unofficial remake of the Broadway play and movie WHOSE LIFE IS IT ANYWAY? (Drefuss, Cassavettes) & AB was supposed to play the Doctor..the Tamil press (including THE HINDU) cried hoarse that AB Sr suffered from ‘inferiority complex’ and developed cold feet when acting with a ‘superior’ actor like Haasan..& hence the film was shelved mid-way… Kuch bhee
A bit surprised by the negative comments on Anil Sharma-Sunny’s Singh Saheb- The Great. The duo have delivered decent films together and their box offcie record together is far from bad.
Gadar is the kind of blockbuster any actor will be dreaming of achieving. The Hero was the third highest grosser of its year. Apne was a fine film that trended well. None of these films can be termed as poor. In terms of quality of cinema, they are decent to very good efforts and none of them is a downright flop as well.
They aren’t as prolific as Yash Chopra- SRK or Rohit Shetty-Devgan but with a record of an all time blockbuster, an average grosser and a semi hit isn’t all that bad.
Sure their movies aren’t everyone’s cup of tea but I found the first look and the title quite good. It’s in the lines of what we first saw from Wanted, Singham etc.. I won’t be too surprised if it ends up doing well at the BO.
As for I Love New Year, it seems to be inspired from The Irony Of Fate which is a very successful and popular 1976 Soviet romantic comedy television film:
Agree……the likes of WANTED, DABANNG, SINGHAM etc are very new age, and Sunny hasn’t attempted this genre in a while……this, I LOVE NY and YPD 2 gives him 3 different films in 3 different genres…
Also, any news of Rajveer Singh Deols aka Rocky’s debut??
After five days the business of Kai Po Che is very similar to ABCD – Any Body Can Dance. Many circuits have similar figures, the only major difference in the business of both films for first five days is that ABCD – Anybody Can Dance was around 25% stronger in Mumbai while Kai Po Che is 50% stronger in Delhi/UP and East Punjab.
The figures in Rajasthan, CI, West Bengal and Mysore are set to be very similar for both films in week one and so will the all India total with Kai Po Che also grossing around the 26 crore nett mark in week one as North India cancels out the lead that ABCD – Any Body Can Dance has in Mumbai.
Kai Po Che has scored well in Mumbai city, Pune, Kolkatta, Bangalore and parts of Delhi NCR while good business in other areas was also going to be a stiff task due to content and no face value although Gujarat could have given the film a boost as it was set there but business remained below the mark in Gujarat and Saurashtra.
Hit Che!
By Taran Adarsh, February 27, 2013 – 08:15 IST
The naysayers, or the prophets of doom, have been proven wrong yet again. KAI PO CHE, starring three relative newcomers, has notched a remarkable total in its opening weekend. You may find this hard to believe, but the Fri-to-Sun figures of KAI PO CHE [Rs 18.10 cr] are better than KAHAANI [Rs 13.83 cr], PAAN SINGH TOMAR [Rs 4.25 cr] and VICKY DONOR [Rs 7.40 cr], which were in the same space [unconventional films, all]. Now that’s a tall achievement, isn’t it?
What’s heartening is that UTV believed in the film and gave it a fantabulous release. Additionally, look at UTV’s confidence in KAI PO CHE: The film had its global premiere at Berlinale nine days prior to its release [on Wednesday], the critics who matter watched the film exactly a week in advance [on Friday], while UTV hosted a gala premiere for the crème de la crème of the entertainment industry in Mumbai five days before it hit the screens in India [on Monday]. Besides, the KAI PO CHE team promoted the film extensively on all platforms [television, radio, internet, print] in India and also in the international markets… As a matter of fact, UTV ensured that the film was ‘visible’ and talked about prior to its release everywhere.
Even the release strategy adopted by UTV for KAI PO CHE was most appropriate, targeting plexes and premium single screens in India. In the international arena, most films starring newcomers rarely get a theatrical release in major markets such as U.K. and U.S.A. [JAANE TU… YA JAANE NA and STUDENT OF THE YEAR are exceptions, but those films had Aamir Khan and Karan Johar, respectively backing the projects — names that enjoy tremendous following in Overseas], but KAI PO CHE was released like any biggie there. The conviction or gamble, whatever you call it, has paid off and how!
The audience mandate was evident on Friday itself, when the morning shows concluded. KAI PO CHE is a rare film that’s riding on glowing reviews and positive audience mandate, hence the business was bound to witness ample growth over the weekend. The day-wise growth in business, even at single screens, is proof that the film has worked big time. The rock-steady business on weekdays clearly indicates that the film has long legs. I am supremely confident that KAI PO CHE will continue to radiate in Weekend 2 as well.
The success of KAI PO CHE will spur film-makers and Studios to endorse movies starring newcomers, with content doing the talking. The success of KAI PO CHE will persuade film-makers to think beyond the stereotype. The success of KAI PO CHE will help introduce fresh, deserving talent at a time when almost all top actors have turned producers and there’s genuine scarcity of new talent in the industry.
Do I hear KAI PO CHE producers Ronnie Screwvala and Siddharth Roy Kapur, director Abhishek Kapoor, writers Pubali Chaudhuri, Supratik Sen, Abhishek Kapoor and Chetan Bhagat, associate producer Manish Hariprasad, actors Rajkumar Yadav, Amit Sadh, Sushant Singh Rajput and Amrita Puri, UTV’s core team of Shikha Kapur [marketing], Gaurav Verma [India distribution], Lokesh Dhar and Amrita Pandey [Overseas distribution] and everyone associated with the film scream with elation, ‘kaipo che’?
PS: The success of VICKY DONOR and now KAI PO CHE also shatters the age-old myth that television actors cannot make it big in movies [Ayushmann Khurrana, Sushant and Amit started their careers in television].
* * * * *
The other release, ZILA GHAZIABAD, a multi-starrer, got eclipsed by the KAI PO CHE wave at plexes, although the film is maintaining quite well at single screens in the mass-dominated belt, especially in U.P.
but the Fri-to-Sun figures of KAI PO CHE [Rs 18.10 cr] are better than KAHAANI [Rs 13.83 cr], PAAN SINGH TOMAR [Rs 4.25 cr] and VICKY DONOR [Rs 7.40 cr], which were in the same space [unconventional films, all]. Now that’s a tall achievement, isn’t it?
Impressive figures. Instead of calling these films as unconventional, we can call them small budget films. What is so unconventional about these films?
You might be already aware of this but if in case you are not- Spike Lee is currently making the Oldboy remake with Josh Brolin playing the lead guy and Sharlto Copley as the baddie.
Why? If Chan Wook himself can do a remake of Stoker I do not see any issue with this if done properly. Now I know that Spike has never handled this genre but otherwise he is a talented guy. I really liked Inside Man (Lee was doing a heist film for the first time here) and 25th Hour was one of the decade’s best films. Jungle Fever and Malcolm X need no introduction.
The major problem as I see it is that the studio might want a more ‘sanitized’ version of the remake by cutting down the violence and the heavy sexually-charged scenes which were integral to the original film
Bcos for some ‘sanitised’ version isn’t enough 🙂
Will catch some movies in a flight now
Incidentally got ‘thirst'(Korean)
Ps: Anya –is it worth watching ?u must have seen it lol
satyam, when trying to get on the website in google chrome, a warning pops up. may be it needs to be fixed?
Satyam:
yes someone else told me about this as well.. I don’t use Chrome but I haven’t had this issue on other browsers. The thing is that there are so many links being posted here that something possibly raises a flag somewhere. In any case the site is housed at wordpress. They take care of a lot of this stuff. Beyond the basic spam related issues and so on don’t think I can do much more.
An Jo:
Yes, I did tell Satyam about this a week back when I started noticing it….it never used to happen before..i always used chrome (the incognito option when in office!!!)
welldone folks with all this malware stuff..
“Please remove ” Phir-Wohi-Raat””–that sounds a dodgy film lol
FOlks–suggest one stops going to dodgy porn/ish sites
Also check what your partner(s) (if any) are upto…
Those who have ‘pet dogs’ should check the surfing history of their ‘dogs’
🙂
Haven’t seen the film yet but I am entirely sympathetic to this piece. Of course when it’s a question of Narendra Modi I don’t find certain questions debatable to begin with. Those who insist on evidence or ‘both sides of the story’ in this context are guilty of moral obtuseness or moral bankruptcy or both. Violence has to be clearly condemned in every situation without any ifs or buts. This doesn’t mean that contexts aren’t important for analytic reasons. But this doesn’t make the violence, specially certain kinds ok. So for instance there’s a while history of colonization in the Mideast, an entire history supporting Islamist elements by the same powers to further certain interests, so on and so forth. All of this analysis is important to figure out what’s really going on. But this doesn’t lessen the obscene violence of the 9/11 attacks or what have you. Much as no Muslim grievance with respect to the Indian govt gives anyone the right to blow up bombs in crowded cities. There can be no negotiation on condemning certain kinds of violence. This doesn’t at all preclude recognizing what else is going on within the same economy of violence. Getting back to Modi Godhra is actually a red herring. Leaving aside the murkiness surrounding this episode let’s assume that what literally happened was that Muslims set fire to the train. This ‘justifies’ what later happened only if one chooses to believe that there was some spontaneous riot rather than the actual state-assisted pogroms that took place. Again a lot of the state’s bureaucratic and administrative machinery being involved doesn’t make every Gujarati Hindu in the state responsible. I wouldn’t even draw a straight line between supporters of Modi and responsibility for this event for the simple reason that people believe a lot of things in an irresponsible way. Which doesn’t make the beliefs harmless but one also cannot draw a straight line between the two. This is in fact the sort of logic that precedes every such act of butchery. Where an entire community is held to be collectively responsible for the a subset of the same. But my larger point here is that there shouldn’t be evasion on this score. Either an act of violence is wrong or it isn’t. When one introduces all kinds of justification one is offering a similar excuse to every monstrous kind of violence in history. So the riots/pogroms happen because of Godhra (even accepting this logic), 9/11 happens because of something else, state violence comes about because of another event, so on and so forth. What great perpetrator of violence in history says he or she is doing so just for the fun of it? They always have ideological excuses at hand!
In an unrelated but analogous vein check out Zizek’s response to Bigelow here:
Put differently when Hitler starts directing people to the camps you don’t start debating whether it is justifiable or not to treat a certain community this way. You assert in the most absolute terms that it is unacceptable.
On the other hand when FDR interns the Japanese you don’t say ‘hey this is bad but it’s still nothing like Nazi Germany’. You reject this as equally unacceptable in the same absolute sense.
When it is this kind of violence there’s no question of degree. It’s not ok to kill people in terrorist attacks if only 10 die. The repellent nature of the act isn’t tied to number. Whether 10 die or a 1000 both are equally obscene acts.
Not disputing a word above by you Satyam, but the article in question is Laughable to say the least. The author’s major Pareshaani is the fact that Chetan Bhagat had praised modi earlier, she just can not digest that fact, so she launching personal attacks on him , bringing in Rushdie, Murthy, and anything and everything… and a bunch of lies !!!
Itnee Nafrat bharee hai inn commies logo mein jitnee Republicans ko Obama sey nahee hai !! LOL!!!
LOL,like Bhagat dont want to take sides and dont want to start another debate about Godhra riots. But am reminded of a dialogue from Sholay where Thakur’s man says- Khota sikka dono bajoo se khota hota hai and Thakur says- Shayad insaan aur sikke mein yehi ek fark hai! There is a lot more to Modi than his role in Godhra riots and like Republicans used to say in defense of Bush that there has been no major domestic terrorist attack after 9/11, there has been no major recurrence of Hindu-Muslim riots in Gujarat after Godhra while before it was a monthly affair. Something to think about. And, it certainly is not because Muslims are suppressed but it became clear that Modi was not going to tolerate their unprovoked precipitating acts lightly and that there was a price to pay.Doesnt quite justify any loss of innocent lives but does make one wonder. And, this comi g from a self confessed liberal! Those opining on Godhra riots often have not lived thru the reality of Hindu- Muslim riots in Gujarat.
Yes but don’t you think there is something disturbing about this logic? Isn’t this exactly the kind that was behind Dawood Ibrahim’s terrorist attacks following the Shiv Sena abetted ‘riots’ in Bombay? Since then nothing has happened in Bombay. And there are people who quote these events approvingly much as the Shiv Sena also had the whole ‘Muslims had to be taught a lesson’ logic.
Secondly there’s no way to prevent the loss of innocent life as long as someone is in the business of teaching some community a lesson.
But also as a pragmatic matter those who engage in such acts aren’t exactly taught a lesson because the larger communities they belong to are terrorized by the state. The Muslim terrorists gallivanting around the globe aren’t particularly bothered that in many Western countries their community is hounded in instances.
Of course all of this is separate from the Godhra debate where to this day things remain murky. But we’ve been through this debate before. Here I was just using this an example in a larger debate.
Yes..very well said Rajen Sir! Agree with you wholeheartedly (for a change).
There was a movie..in recent times…on how this top politician takes money from Pakistan and get the riots going! It was quite a movie. I forgot the name and title of the movie right this minute. Most politicians are corrupt in India…well..all of them. Except for Modi!! He is the only one who never cared for minority votes…even Bajpai/Advani…all those gave hajj subsidies when time came. I personally don’t think there were state sponsored “pograms” as commies tend to indicate. I don’t think Modi had any other hand other than a slight delay (3 days)…but why crucify him. Sonia and her people didn’t do anything for week when that girl was raped, in recent times. No one gets persecuted in India for “delay”. Even in movies, the police coming in long after crime is done, is so expected and normal. So somehow Modi is supposed to be very-very efficient and stop riots right away? It doesn’t work like that in India unfortunately.
the problem with Modi is not about efficiency. These are the terms of the debate invented by those who refuse to see the horror of his crimes. Essentially there are two versions here:
1)The murkiness surrounding the Godhra events and pogroms that were engineered with the active involvement of Modi’s state machinery.
2)That Godhra caused the riots that followed. Muslims originated the attacks, Hindus took revenge quite naturally.
The problem is that there is no objective history or analysis of Godhra whether nationally or from outside India that confirms the second ‘version’ here. Which the adherents of Modi deal with by calling a vast leftist conspiracy. Presumably one that’s operative globally too since the only thing people are interested in is bringing down Modi.
But even if one accepts the first half of the second version there were no ‘riots’. There was nothing ‘natural’ about what followed. It was engineered. All of this is incidentally very well-played out in Dev. Once again the Modi adherents have to deny this. They have to pretend that there’s something very abstract and uncontrolled that happened in every sense except of course with the original event where the same folks are sure as to what precisely happened!
However, even if one accepts the second version at face value there is something very terrifying about this logic in the ways I’ve outlined above with the Dawood Ibrahim example. But in addition to this it’s a bit like saying that once 9/11 happens it would be perfectly ‘natural’ and ‘legitimate’ if all Muslims who had nothing to do with the attacks were nonetheless ruthlessly attacked and if the same collateral damage argument was used there. Here I will once again refer to my longer point above. One is ethically repulsive if one draws this equivalence irrespective of what version of events one believes.
But then within the liberal supporters of Modi there is another logic whereby one doesn’t support the violence but one also keeps it consigned to a ‘grey area’ in one’s mind where one ‘never really knows’ what happened either way and one also asserts that Modi’s reputation cannot be reduced to this event. The problem that this entire logic right down to the last letter sounds suspiciously like the kind used to defend Hitler and many other fascists in history (in fact many totalitarian figures of both stripes). So with Hitler he created an economic boom in Germany, things were great, he restored national pride by showing Britain and France that they couldn’t dictate terms anymore, so on and so forth. The Modi variant of this is — he he’s not just about the riots, consider how great Ahmmedavad/Amdavad has been under him! Meanwhile people become expert commentators on the plight of Muslims in the state. There have been extensive human rights reports on what happened during the pogroms but also the fear with which many minorities have lived in the state since. All of this can once again be neatly dismissed as global leftist paranoia which apparently has no grander target than Narendra Modi!
But the very same folks in the US context are suddenly very suspicious of the current Republican party if not haters of it and are great supporters of Obama. Suddenly when the Republicans bring up similar ‘commie’ (as Rocky would have it) charges against Obama they are all crazies and kooks! I am the greatest critic of the present day Republican party but I find it more than laughable if Narendra Modi and the BJP are considered more benign political forces than the Republican party! It beggars belief!
There is lots of evidence and unbiased reporting and analysis on the events of Godhra and what transpired after this. One can choose not to believe it in the service of a political ideology and/or other more personal considerations. But the horrible lesson that one learns from events like Nazism is precisely that ordinary people doing very ordinary things were nonetheless participants, consciously or otherwise, in one of the worst political systems in history. For all this I had the harshest reaction to the movie Firaaq because for me it precisely isn’t about the people of Gujarat or any such essentialist argument. I do not believe Muslims are prone to anything, nor Hindus in the same way, nor Gujaratis and so on. There is always political ideology that intervenes and makes people at times monstrous political actors. To submit Modi to the harshest criticism is not to submit the people of Gujarat to the same, not even for that matter many other BJP leaders to the same (with whom I might disagree violently but I do recognize differences in degree).
Getting back to the familiar right/left debate that I and Rocky often banter about (because we are friends) the problem is that once again this is all too familiar a paradigm. The Fascist right always presents the left as dangerous communists against whom certain kinds of violence or what have you is justified. Now of course there are monstrous Communist histories in the twentieth century and beyond. But this is the bogeyman the Right successfully employs in all circumstances. So In Nazi Germany you had the Jews who were a minority but apparently running things and controlling all the levers of power and so on. A Nazi politics was then needed to cleanse the country. But you also had a virulent anti-Communist politics at the same level. In the Hindutva version of the same Muslims do the same and the rest follows. Here the specter of old Muslim conquests (which were of course very brutal at many points though presumably one also takes into account the global standards of say the 16th century or whatever it is, in these matters, and doesn’t judge them by 20th century ones, not that this more recent century offers many more enlightened examples) comes in handy though it is in principle not very different from the old European stereotypes of the ‘nefarious’, ‘blood-sucking’, ‘Christ-killing’ (this beats the Somnath desecration doesn’t it?!) Jews who were secretly controlling and in the process deliberately weakening all the nice Christian nations!
Once again it’s not about political ideology which is an altogether different debate but the extent to which one is willing to be blind to the truth to support the same or willing to explain away the most basic human considerations as part of some abstract calculus. I’m a great Obama supporter but that doesn’t mean I find the Drone policy ok. I understand the relevant history here, how and why this logic has come about, so on and so forth.. but I still don’t find the final result ok. There are certain things in life that have to be asserted unconditionally. To bring up Zizek’s example once more if a woman is being raped we should stop the rape first before anything else. We shouldn’t start a debate about what led to the rape and who’s more responsible for it and whatever! When we engage in these abstract kinds of logic where even though we might consciously assert that we don’t support the loss of innocent human life we are quite willing to consign the same to some measure of collateral damage (hey ‘they’ did it to us first) we end up contradicting ourselves. This gets me back to that ‘burning building’ sequence in Dev. Nothing justifies this. Not the terrorist attack that preceded it. Nothing at all. The moment we place these kinds of atrocities in some larger, economic calculus of violence we immediately justify the original event too. Because those actors also work with the same logic except that they have a different narrative. They too think they’re justified.
On that note this book offers a lucid summary of all the relevant issues:
Nussbaum is a well-known thinker who for many years has focused on religious intolerance around the globe and has written different books detailing these excesses in different societies. Check out some of the blurbs here.
I dont think the blog will be served well by rehashing of the arguments by the two sides about the Godhra and the post- Godhra incidents. However, the idea that the Godhra burning of Karsewaks didnt happen or wasnt an unprovoked Muslim act ( pre-planned or not) is absurd.
As to the retaliation and Modi government’s role in it, my argument is that it is not black and white.
History has shown us that nothing has worked in Gujarat and in India as prevention of Hindu-Muslim riots go. There should again be NO argument whatsoever as to which side should bear the lions share of the blame. Any notion that Muslims in India are suppressed or oppressed is ABSOLUTELY preposterous. They enjoy the same rights if not more and a significant section abuses those. Aided and abetted by Congress and its allies, they are pandered to in a ridiculous manner. They have no grounds to play victim. Even if one argues thst the vast majority ( and it is not true) of Muslims in India dont behave in an irresponsible or communal manner, they certainly are willing to merrily go along without questioning or opposing the practices of the unruly and communal elements. And, are often sympathetic. They are not so INNOCENT and bear some responsibility for the state of affairs too. The real question is when one talks about the ‘innocent’ Muslims, one wonders how innocent they really are and how many of them. My personal experience is not much and not too many. I dont want to denounce an entire community but truth is truth
Satyam, I Agree with Rajen, let’s leave this discussion….
I have to say this though that you are one of the very few people whose personal intergrity in regards to this whole debate I do NOT doubt…..I have in the past compared you to Shourie which to me is the biggest compliment I can give anyone.
one day we shall have a drink and thrash this issue out….
My main objective of putting up this article was to show that the author forgot all about the merits of the movie and started trashing Bhagat and Gujrat and Modi…….this is what these Jholawallaha do !!!
thanks for the comment Rocky and as I’ve said before where you are concerned it’s a debate between friends. Rajen is on the left side of the equation anyway with a Gujarat exception thrown in!
Aside – yeh Rajen sahab bol rahen hain ya Dev key Om Puri bol rahe hain….LOL!!!
Rajen – you will be getting timeout for 4 days from SS for Satyavachan !!
“Aside – yeh Rajen sahab bol rahen hain ya Dev key Om Puri bol rahe hain….LOL!!!”
Rajen on the other side of Bachchan! This truly is the Kalyug!
Jokes aside I think Rajen is to your left generally except on the Modi matter where he is to your right!
Ultimately though you are an AAA kind of person. You’re secretly far more on Desai’s Nehruvian side (much as you’ll hate this characterization!) at least in a cultural sense than you think. And herein lies the problem. The Muslim ‘invader’ can be argued against at a political level but the cultural strands just cannot be separated. Much as we are all minimally children of British colonialism.
“check out this link..”
Aap logo nay yeh link dekha?!?!!!!! Satyam needs to go to Godhra some day…maybe take a train and see what happens….
P.S: I have!
PS1: This is the problem I have with “satyam”. He never is dynamic in his thoughts. I mean…one should be little flexible naa?! I changed my thoughts on Abhishek interacting with him. Now he too should try to be a little flexible 🙂
never took a train to Afghanistan or Yemen either. I just assume the Drones cause a certain kind of damage. I am also shamelessly inflexible when it comes to the US atomic bombing of Japan. Never took a train ride to Hiroshima though. The Turks massacred a million Armenians a century ago. To this day the state refuses to accept this. In fact it is a crime to assert this publicly in that country. Once again I never took a train ride there. The Turkish govt (at least for the longest time) assures me it’s all propaganda. I tend to choose my train rides carefully…
As I see it, Hindu majority in India has too two options – Silently suffer the habitual shenanigans of the Muslims or retaliate and be accused of genocide !
There are too many well meaning but deluded and misguided ‘liberals” to pick up the cudgels on behalf of the ‘innocent’ and ‘repressed’ Muslims !
“All I can say is that as a work of fiction it is interesting but certainly not meant for serious consumption!”
True.
At some point they will say that Godhra never happened. That later riots were just unprovoked attacks!
In Godhar train compartments all were hindus. The later/follow-up hindu-muslim riots had more hindus dying than the minority people (as it happens in any riots)
I thought the Muslim:Hindu ratio in the post-Godhra violence was 3:1 but hey this could be another Western conspiracy..! Actually those are the govt figures, many independent bodies think the imbalance was even greater than that. Anyway don’t wish to rake this up all over again. The larger debate matters more to me.
“never took a train to Afghanistan or Yemen either. …”
Satyam..you always stand the argument on its head to make it appear “OK”! Those comparitions are invalid and we can also go back and forth all day long on this!
Firstly I am referring to the article that you posted (google doc one). ONLY if you took the train to Godhara, for instance, you will see lot of fallacies in that argument.
* Do you know what meaning of Godhara is? Do you know who lives there?
* Do you know WHAT time the train arrives there? etc etc etc
So your arguemnts on “train” to yemen, japan,istambul..yada..yada doesn’t matter. THAT was NOT my point!!!!!
If you know FACTS, then you can check the “evidence” that the stupid author has authored! There are LOTS of anti-Semitic people who present “facts” of how holocaust never happened…would you then implicitly trust that “evidence”. So garbage-in, garbage-out (as they say in my field).
There is some irony isn’t there in using the same sources for objective evidence on the Holocaust that one later denies when the same objective evidence is presented for what might or might not have happened at Godhra?!
Why are my analogies invalid though? I find the Drone policy problematic or brutal or whatever but I have never actually visited Afghanistan and never actually seen what happens in any area where there’s a Drone strike. There are those who say it’s completely clean and those who say that there is a lot of collateral damage. It is precisely the same argument.
By the way in debates on 9/11 I tend not to quiz people on the linguistic origins of Manhattan or the cultural histories of NYC or what times the trains pull in at Grand Central or Penn Station. I admit my logical lapses here.
Our media celebs hate it if Muslims are caught in hate-speeches or acts of terror. They probably wish it were Hindus instead. They can’t even stand the acquittal of Hindus in many legal cases. If a Hindu is acquitted it’s like a criminal was allowed to go scot-free. If Muslims are arrested then their community is being victimised. This is the essence of “Sickularism”. Then again, when some were convicted in the Godhra train burning and terror case NDTV promptly announced that “63 were acquitted”. Yes indeed, those were “innocent” Muslims”. But when the courts acquitted 29 in the Naroda Patiya case of Gujarat 2002 they were “let off”. These 29 Hindus were, of course, guilty as hell and the courts had let them off and allowed them to walk free. Such injustice, eh? That’s the kind of hatred that NDTV breeds for justice and contempt for Hindus even when courts pronounced verdict. Just in case you forgot, these same channels called the Ayodhya verdict of the Allahabad High Court a “Panchayati verdict”. http://www.mediacrooks.com/2013/03/intolerable-acquittals.html
LOL on the last bit! Though I note your shift. In one context you privilege the left side of the debate (for the Republicans it is precisely Obama who’s the commie!), in the other the right one!
2b concise–in these contexts—the frequency, scale and intensity of ‘offences’ also matter (infact should matter)…
Very well said.
Here Modi factor is always an enigma. Rajen says, that communal clashes have come to end in gujarat after the pogrom. It is like spanking a rebellious boy and making him obedient for the time being. But what about the resentment that is being harboured? Which is like a ticking timebomb ready to explode? Will that tag moth ka saudagar will ever leave? Bofors is till associated with the gandhi family even after such a long time and so is Emergency and Sikh riots.
Teaching a lesson is a very dangerous thing unless you eliminate the enemy completely. A wounded tiger will wait for
another chance. What about Haren Pandya? Was he also taught a lesson?
If gujarat has become such a safe place, why Modi has such an unprecedented security around himself? If he is that popular among everyone, who will harm him knowing the repercussions?
Sanju- I’m trying to avoid heavy duty stuff
No need for more ‘stress’ lol
Ps: c’mon folks–
We don’t ask for Megan foxes on flight
But atleast there shouldn’t be gramps about to go into retirement !!!
Ps: will hav to do something …lol
This is one of THE MAJOR problems I had with this movie..the problem of pretense..it makes the movie so superficial/ridiculous while trying to be ‘oh so for the youth’ and so ‘confident’ of its craft..The craft might be good..but the soul is HUGELY corrupted..
The writer has WRITTEN very well what I felt as soon as I saw the movie..
Sometimes I feel such soul-corrupted movies do more damage to the perennially indifferent bubble-gum chewing crowd that a 100 Owaisis or Togadia put together…
OmSaab…the promos of RGV’s new filim are really good…seems like he is back in form…pura sixer mara hai. RGV is big bhagat of K. Bigelow. After a long time RGV was really ‘scared’ and has been careful in making this flick.
Rocky saab..agar aap pirated DVD mai sab movies dekha karogey toh filmmakers kaisey survive hongey, haaii?
PS: did you see some of RGV’s tweets on K.B? They are most interesting 😉
who is KB? also went to his timeline did not see anything ?
I always wait for original DVD and watch it on big TV…never seen a movie on computer screen ….
Kathryn Bigelow. KB
Attach your cell phone or laptop to TV. There are some fun sites which have free movies, advert free, high quality dvd. I do that from time to time for older movies. Oscar apps for behind the scene from my cell to tv…but didn’t watch it for too long.
I watched Ishkzadey from my laptop to tv. 🙂
Some of my friends watch cricket on their big screen (laptop to tv) all the time….
Di jee, abhee January mein hee pehlee baar smart phone liya hai….bahut bewakoof banata hai, dabao 5, dabta 4 hai, , my friends say it takes time to get used to the touch screen…
abhee fihaal toh badee uljhan ho rahee hai… LOL
Me too…though “techy” I am totally “untechy” in mamlo mai. Also it is total RIP OFF….my whole career was nearly with cell ph. companies up until recently 😦
It is all part of “demonstration” effect and sajish from the capitalist
PS: one of the big admiration I have for bigb: moving with times and technology!
PS1: my kiddos have their own laptops even before elementary school and they lock the laptop keyboard on me (I just figured out how to unlock it this morning!) lolz
LOL, same here, my kids know more about the phones than me at this point, my daughter has already downloaded all kinds of stuff on her phone , wheras my phone does not have a single app. LOL!!
PS-bought three Samsung Galaxy3 at the same time !!
this show started airing on HBO yesterday, the DVD though is already available in Britian, will probably end up getting the latter as I’m a great fan of the book…
NY Times:
February 25, 2013
Television Review
Not the Same Old Cup of British Tea
By ALESSANDRA STANLEY
Saying that a television series depicts the English aristocracy on the brink of World War I and beyond is almost a disservice — the description sounds like yet another big Masterpiece Theater bore, or worse, an amusing one like “Downton Abbey.” “Parade’s End,” a co-production of the BBC and HBO that begins on Tuesday on HBO, looks like a lush elegy to the Edwardian age, but it’s not nearly as swoony and nostalgic as most others of the genre. Tom Stoppard adapted Ford Madox Ford’s tetralogy into a five-part series, streamlining and speeding up the story without dumbing it down.
Like Ford’s modernist opus, and its brainy, punctilious hero, Christopher Tietjens (Benedict Cumberbatch), the series is not easy to follow or instantly love, but it is impossible to dismiss. That’s partly thanks to artful storytelling and gifted acting, especially by Rebecca Hall, who is a bewitching hoot in the role of Christopher’s bored, unfaithful wife, Sylvia.
It’s a series that inevitably draws comparisons with “Downton Abbey,” since they share the same upper-class trappings and totems. Tietjens, a brilliant statistician, is an old-fashioned English gentleman, good with horses, furniture and propriety. He is chivalrously loyal to Sylvia, a spoiled beauty who scorns her husband’s stuffy rectitude, even as she is piqued by it. She dismisses him as a “great lump,” yet can’t stop poking him.
“Parade’s End” tells the story of a bad marriage, set in a much broader context of a rotting civilization.
And that’s the real difference between it and “Downton Abbey.” That show is a gauzy anachronism in period costumes; the first novel of “Parade’s End” was published in 1924, and the series is enmeshed in the great cataclysm of the time, underscoring the cruelty of the age as much as its charm.
It’s more cleareyed about a lot of things, including the British class system. Even kindhearted masters don’t confide in their servants; they barely talk to them. Sylvia flippantly refers to her indispensable maid as “Hallo Central” — in the novel she explains that it’s because the maid has a tinny voice, like a telephone operator’s.
And unlike “Downton Abbey,” which used the trench warfare in France mostly as a plot device to keep young lovers apart, “Parade’s End” is, above all else, a treatise on the Great War, the massacre of an entire generation of young men at the front, and also the poisoning of an entire class looking on from the safety of club chairs and literary salons.
Nobody in London society believes that war in Europe is imminent except Tietjens, who has been warning his friends and colleagues about German militarism for years. Then again, he is outmoded even in those blinkered social circles, a man who, unlike the narrator of the other Ford Madox Ford classic, “The Good Soldier,” isn’t deluded at all; Tietjens may well be the last lucid man in England.
Except when it comes to his love life. In the opening episode Tietjens is tricked into marrying Sylvia, who is pregnant by a married man and needs a husband to avoid social ruin. Sylvia is a handful: a Roman Catholic who is impious, unfaithful, selfish, callous, malicious and, unexpectedly, good-humored — she can laugh even at her own absurdities. She is effortlessly alluring. Even as he is dragging himself to the altar, Tietjens can’t help flashing back to his seduction and admitting that he finds Sylvia “glorious.”
Nor is Sylvia entirely wrong about her husband’s priggishness. “I will not see you incommoded,” he tells an author he has decided to help. “You’ve written the only novel since the 18th century I’ve not had to correct in the margins.”
Tietjens’s moral standards are tested when he meets a lovely, high-minded young suffragist, Valentine (Adelaide Clemens), who returns his affections. He sticks to his principles, but the two are smeared by gossip and calumny anyway.
Tietjens doesn’t punish Sylvia or fight his enemies, partly because that would be bad form, but also because he has a martyr’s streak with fantasies of being an Anglican saint. His passivity — and devotion to lost causes like honor and duty — might seem quaintly pointless, except that it mirrors the soldier’s fate in combat.
When war is declared, Tietjens resigns from his cushy government job and signs up for the trenches. It’s not so different from civilian life.
As Tietjens demonstrates, a virtuous person in society is almost as helpless and ill used as the soldier who is forced to risk his life following senseless orders, a sitting duck under enemy fire and the shortsightedness and self-advancement of politicians, bureaucrats and generals. Nobility lies in sacrifice as much as in bold action.
It’s all very tragic, except that the series is often quite funny. Mr. Stoppard sifts delicious bits of dialogue from the novel’s long, stream-of-consciousness monologues, and he is especially good at drawing out the light comedy beneath all the ill will and betrayal.
When Tietjens agrees to take Sylvia back after she runs off with a lover, he decides that they should move out of their grand town house. The explanation he gives sounds like something Oscar Wilde’s Lady Bracknell would say. “ I shan’t have a house again,” he says. “Anything beyond a flat looks like impudence in a man who can’t keep his wife.”
It is to Mr. Cumberbatch’s credit that he delivers such lines without a smile or a smirk, as befits his unusual character. The actor, who plays a dashing, hyperactive Sherlock Holmes in the recent BBC adaptation “Sherlock,” is almost unrecognizable in this role. His Tietjens is both pompous and self-aware, attractive and ungainly, though never homely enough to justify Valentine’s exclamation, “You’re not so dreadfully ugly, really.”
“Downton Abbey” may be sweeter and easier to follow, but it’s like a new desk stripped and distressed to look like an antique. Next to it “Parade’s End” looks like the real thing, less to modern tastes perhaps, but all the more distinctive.
2 movies are releasing this friday and all the eyes are on only one movie.
Nana Patekar has given an extensive interview to Tellychakkar.com where he talked about his portrayal of Rakesh Maria and other things concerning the movie.
Dismayed by how veteran actor Sadashiv Amrapurkar has aged, the much in-demand Nawazuddin Siddiqui has decided to take a sabbatical after he finishes his current assignment.
Nawazuddin, who suddenly finds himself inundated with quality work, will take a few months break as soon as he wraps up shooting for Buddhadeb Dasgupta’s “Anwar Ka Ajab Kissa”.
“I waited for 11 years to get good work. Now when I am finally getting the kind of work that I wanted with directors I dreamt of working with all my life, I don’t want to mess up my career by burning myself out,” said the actor who became big after “Kahaani” and “Gangs of Wasseypur”.
“I have been working non-stop and I really need to slow down. I’ve to take a pause to recharge my batteries. So after I complete Buddhadeb Dasgupta’s film, which starts in Kolkata from March 22 and goes on at a stretch for 40 days, I’ll be taking time off,” he added.
Apparently, the need to conserve his energies came to Nawazuddin while shooting with veteran Sadashiv Amrapukar for Dibakar Bannerjee’s short film that will be a part of “Bombay Talkies”.
He said: “I was dismayed to see how old he seemed although he’s just 57-58. We actors tend to give too much of ourselves. And that’s fine. But somewhere we also need to renew our creative energies from time to time.”
It would be a kind of home coming for Nawazuddin when he starts shooting for “Anwar Ka Ajab Kissa” in Kolkata.
“Actually it was that film (‘Kahaani’), which brought me out of my 11-year-old struggle to be noticed. So I consider Kolkata to be lucky,” said the actor.
He would be leaving for Kolkata later this month to look around and get a hang of his character’s milieu.
“I wanted to work with Buddadeb Dasgupta from the time I saw his film ‘Tahader Katha’. It was visually stunning. And also, this brilliant director returns to Hindi cinema for the first time since he made ‘Andhi Gali’. So I had no choice but to say yes,” he said.
At the moment Nawazuddin finds himself so busy he is unable to devote time to promoting his new film “Aatma”, while his co-star Bipasha Basu has started promoting the film.
“I will be starting my promotion soon. I haven’t been able to do so until now,” said the actor.
Top politicians like LK Advani and Kapil Sibal attended special screening of Ramgopal Varma’s film The Attacks of 26/11 in New Delhi on Wednesday evening.
Advani it is learnt to have told Varma brilliant a few times in the middle of the screening and was bowled over by the movie. One of his colleagues even suggested that the film should be screened in parliament for the MPs.
Shahnawaz Husain of the BJP told reporters outside, “ Pakistan should learn from this.” Some of the other politicians who saw the film were Ramvilas Paswan , Balbir Punj, Naveen Jindal, Raj Babbar and Jaya Pradha.
Varma tweeted, “Member of parliament Rajeev pratap rudy told me that he wants to arrange a show of 26/11 for all the MPs inside the parliament.”
“Once again I never took a train ride….”
Not that I am trying to “debate” with ya, knowing how you welcome new ideas 😉
But would like to share a real story.
Once upon a time, there was a young, dynamic, super-duper smart and communist/socialist idealist to boot (all those adjectives apply to many here). He had dreams of making lot of orphanages. He was travelling in Europe someplace via train. He was very hungry and didn’t have any food. Something happened and a gestapo’s guy locked our innocent, hungry hero in a dark cell with out food and water. This was communist country. Finally after 72 hrs he got out and out of him all the bhoot of communism came from both sides of ears. He became die-hard capitalist (with tons of compassion) and went on to create lot of wealth and lot of good in country like India and also created many orphanages. He is hero of many youngsters and old people alike. You prolly know him also!
Moral of the story: one should hold on to some ideology and certain ideas upto a point. When evidence presents to you (and hopefully you are personally involved in the situation or hopefully not) then you should also learn to “let go”, “unlearn” or “learn” new lesson. Otherwise one would be come dogmatic, dakiyanusi.
P.S.: we are married to you…in sickness and in health…this sickness part we will tolerate in you. lolz
Not sure what made you believe I’m a communist! This is why one must read things carefully and not just assume stuff based on one’s predispositions one way or the other. I am quite far from any notion of communism. I am actually often not even particularly happy with liberal discourses in most countries if not all. Being a critic of the Right does not mean one can only do so from the position of a committed communist! The problem precisely is that you are unable to think of these things without resorting to this opposite. So an ‘either/or’ deal. As a strategic matter I might prefer voting with the left but that’s a different matter. It’s sometimes about choosing what I consider a better framing of the key issues even though I might disagree with how things are approached within that framing. But your assumption could more or less be re-stated as ‘if one doesn’t vote for the Dems in the US one must be a racist right-winger’!
As for ‘changing one’s mind’ this is a charge that you frequently throw at me but I actually think I am changing my mind all the time. I often don’t have ‘set in stone’ views on anything to begin with. Why does it seem this way to you? Well assuming that you’re completely sincere in this belief it is a question once again of reading things carefully. So let’s take the Abhishek debate. I have said many times I don’t particularly care whether anyone loves or hates Abhishek. Why then do I debate this topic so much? Because I argue with the ‘terms’ in which the dissent comes about. There are lots of other ways of framing an anti-Abhishek opinion that wouldn’t bother me at all even if I disagreed. I might not even argue. The same for Ratnam to offer another example. If someone has serious problems with the entire project or signature that Ratnam represents that’s perfectly. My argument only begins when this opposition is framed in ways that I consider non-serious. I could multiply these examples. I argue against so much Amitabh Bachchan has done from his work to his political interventions and so on tons of times on his very blog. A lot of the criticism has been quite strong (or ‘harsh’) and it’s entirely a credit to him that he doesn’t mind it. But is it likely that I am questioning him so often in so many ways but otherwise promoting a dogmatic approach elsewhere? Once again one must be willing to read.
It’s about the level at which the discussion takes place. So for instance I often have questions about Ratnam’s cinema and I have talked about these in the past but if the debate only revolves around whether he even knows how to make films or at some absurdly simplistic level like that I am of course going to defend him. So in a political discussion if one is talking purely about liberal politics I have very many criticisms. But if the only two choices in a debate are between the left and the right I will without doubt choose the former. But this is a problem with the way the debate is structured. Which is why for instance on this whole Modi issue I started off with a much more expansive comment where I tried to move away from the old divides. And in today’s longer comment I once again tried to ‘globalize’ things.
Finally it isn’t about evidence because I don’t agree with what you define as ‘evidence’. To use a final example there are those who consider the cow simply a mammal that provides great steaks. There are however also those who consider it a sacred animal that ought not to be slaughtered. What’s the evidence either way? It is fundamentally an ethical decision whether one falls in one camp or the other, by way or religious belief or philosophical orientation or whatever. Neither side denies the obvious zoological ‘evidence’ about the cow!
Now when it comes to more political debates it is true that the question of evidence is a lot more thorny. Nazis often genuinely believed that there was clear evidence of what the Jews had done for centuries and continued to do. On the other side there is no document bearing Hitler’s signature ordering the Holocaust. So maybe he wasn’t responsible? The word ‘evidence’ cannot just be thrown out loosely like this. Because it seems neutral but in fact isn’t. There’s always a value system from within which ‘evidence’ is interpreted. And so there is evolutionary evidence arguing against the Biblical worldview on this matter. On the other hand there is the pseudo-scientist creationist view whereby God himself sets the chain of evolution into motion.
Is there a way out of all this? Yes. One must be aware of the assumptions on which one’s argument rests. One can continue to believe them even after such ‘deconstruction’ is done. But as an informed ethical choice and not naively. And so I might not be interested in the films of Pasolini but this is not some objective view. I am aware of ‘why’ I don’t like his films or don’t respond to them. I don’t start saying that he doesn’t know how to make movies (though Fellini came close to suggesting this!).
But again it is always about how the field of argument is being framed. If you told me that the only two choices I had in India were to vote for the BJP or run the chance of installing a Societ-style dictatorship I would choose the former. In a lot of these debates the latter doesn’t come up because outside N Korea it really isn’t a very serious model anymore that many societies are emulating as was once true. But the Fascist danger is still very much alive because we see manifestations of this in various countries in ways in which we do not see evidence of Communism! In the context of SL politics I am all for Tamil identity (even though I am certainly not supportive of the great violence that the LTTE has often chosen as a path.. though as in all such situations the violence perpetrated by the State is not even recognized as such). However if there were a Tamil nation-state I would be far less inclined to treat the same ethic-linguistic nationalism as benignly. So even with the very same subject contexts make all the difference in the world.
The problem with these comments Satyam is that your consistency appears to be confused for obstinacy. Excellent commentary from you top to bottom on this thread today, makes for fascinating reading.
Meant to say this to you earlier but it would be really helpful for us if you (or GF/Q) could atleast write a para on the film(s) you have recently seen. I, for one, really find it really informative if I get to read them right before/after watching that film. For instance you had The Killer Joe on your current viewing section some days back. Would have loved to get your thoughts on it (not only on the film but also on how you would compare with Friedkin’s earlier works).
“Not sure what made you believe I’m a communist!”
Hey Bhagwan!
Rolling my eyes.
P.S. I will come back later to read, rest of what you said in the article.
ROFLOL….Satyam…you are too cute…though you wrongly argue most of the time 😉
On Narayan Murthy: It was an analogy…did not mean YOU are communist. Hey Bhagwan!
SATYAMSHOT 
February 22, 2013 at 5:57 AM
B.O. update: ‘Kai Po Che’ starts well at plexes, ‘Zila Ghaziabad’ at single screens
By Taran Adarsh, February 22, 2013 – 14:50 IST
KAI PO CHE fetched a flying start at multiplexes of major centres. The opening shows in Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Pune, Delhi-NCR, Gurgaon, Chandigarh, Kolkata, Indore, Bhopal, Jaipur and Bangalore ranged from good to very good, with the youth thronging the plexes from the morning shows itself. The fantastic pre-release promotion by UTV, coupled with the tremendous following of writer Chetan Bhagat amongst youth, ensured impressive footfalls at major centres. The response in Punjab and U.P. was not up to the mark. Released in 1,000 screens in India, the business is expected to grow manifold towards the evening/night shows.
On the other hand, ZILA GHAZIABAD opened quite well across single screens of mass belt. Expectedly, the opening was weak at plexes, but the single screen audience, especially in U.P., gave the film a head start due to the action genre.
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February 22, 2013 at 6:00 AM
Kai Po Che Decent Opening Zilla Ghaziabad Dull Opening
Friday 22nd February 2013 12.30 IST
Boxofficeindia.Com Trade Network
Koi Po Che had a decent opening of around 40-45% while Zilla Ghaziabad was dull across the board with around 20% Kai Po Che was helped by good collections in the premium multiplex areas of Mumbai, Pune and Delhi NCR though some other parts of the country like UP and Punjab were low. The film had no face value but the promotion created awareness especially in the big cities where collections are much better.
Zilla Ghaziabad was dull in the morning and stands no chance at the box office as a film like Kai Po Che can improve as the day goes along but Zilla Ghaziabad being an action film has limited upside.
Both films have Hollywood release A Good Day To Die Hard for competition which also did not open well apart from a few centres in East Punjab where there is the novelty of the film being dubbed in Punjabi for the first time.
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February 22, 2013 at 5:58 AM
Top 5: ‘Murder 3’ recovers cost, in profit zone!
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February 22, 2013 at 6:01 AM
Special 26 Has Decent Second Week
Friday 22nd February 2013 10.30 IST
Boxofficeindia.Com Trade Network
Special 26 had a decent second week of around 15 crore nett which has taken the two week business of the film to nearly 54 crore nett. The film maintained best in Delhi NCR, East Punjab and Mysore.
The film has actually found appreciation in some parts but the opening was a killer and it is tough to recover from such an opening. the final business of the film is looking in the 60-62 crore nett range which is a decent total especially considering the opening the film took.
The final total will be in same range as Khiladi 786 which grossed around 63 crore nett. That film had collected around 16 crore nett in week two.
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February 22, 2013 at 5:59 AM
NY Times:
February 21, 2013
Movie Review
Bromance, Cricket and Sectarian Riots
By RACHEL SALTZ
Abhishek Kapoor’s “Kai Po Che” takes risks, not least in its choice of subject matter. Set in Ahmedabad, this tale of three friends making their way in the new India builds up to an ugly moment in recent history: the 2002 riots in Gujarat State in which Hindu mobs attacked Muslims, killing nearly 1,000.
Ambitious but uneven, “Kai Po Che” (based on Chetan Bhagat’s novel “The Three Mistakes of My Life”) mixes, not quite successfully, traditional Bollywood storytelling with something less conventional. Perhaps that’s because it was adapted from a contemporary novel, which remains rare in commercial Hindi cinema. Also unusually, the movie doesn’t use star power to hammer home a message.
The three friends are a typically mismatched collection. Ishaan (Sushant Singh Rajput) is the handsome one, volatile and a gifted cricket player. Govind (Raj Kumar Yadav) is the nerdy numbers guy. And Omi (Amit Sadh) is … well, what is he? Not much more than a narrative necessity, a Hindu from a religious family whose uncle, ominously, is a high muck-a-muck in a nationalist political party.
With its locations in Ahmedabad, Gujarat’s largest city, and its careful references to time — the date is often flashed on screen, which for South Asian viewers, at least, is a clear marker of what’s to come — the movie sets up expectations of a certain kind of realism that it delivers only fitfully.
Mr. Kapoor too often gives the brothers-for-life theme the Bollywood treatment, including a bromantic song montage full of elegiac bonding: We’re young! We’re crazy! We jump off parapets into the green, green sea! That might work in another film, but here it takes up space, going sentimental when the story needs to go deep. Less generic is the plotline involving Ishaan’s discovery of a Muslim boy, Ali (Digvijay Deshmukh), cricket’s version of the Natural, and their complicated teacher-student relationship.
Omi is too bland for his (spoiler, I suppose) metamorphosis into a glassy-eyed, scimitar-wielding Hindu marauder to resonate. But the Ishaan-Ali story grows more interesting as the threat of violence increases, and then turns to bloodshed. (Here too the movie mixes a realistic impulse with a mythic, only-in-the-movies showdown.) And though a sudsy epilogue rings false, there’s a measure of optimism in the story’s insistence that communal barriers can be transcended, however briefly or imperfectly, through the national pastime, cricket.
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February 22, 2013 at 6:29 AM
Amit Sadh and Rajput are from the tv world. It is good to see bollywood opening up to tv artists then and now.
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February 22, 2013 at 7:25 AM
As an Ahmedabadi an gujarati, Rooney’s take on this film will be interesting. Will the lawyer oblige?
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February 22, 2013 at 7:56 AM
lol…I was thinking along the same lines (asking Rooney). Though the town creates the mood…then lets see what the ‘plot’ holds….
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February 22, 2013 at 11:27 AM
I have busy working and now i am sick and on bed rest ( again !! ) but i intend to watch the movie, and hopefully looking forward to write about it. But will take few weeks to catch this movie 😦
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February 22, 2013 at 11:34 AM
Get well soon.
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February 22, 2013 at 8:26 AM
i am little apprehensive about the media/reviews going ga-ga over KPC – don’t think that it will be a mammoth bo success unless it really turns out to be what these media people are shouting from the roof-top….
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February 22, 2013 at 11:58 AM
such comments are appearing on fb regarding KPC:
“Nostalgic ‘Kai po che’…Too amdavadi…..Must watch for amdavadi……esp NRA(non resident amdavadis)….”
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February 22, 2013 at 1:25 PM
Rooney,
Samajhdar ko ishara kafi hai! Intend to watch it for sure!
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February 22, 2013 at 3:52 PM
quite interested in this mostly for the city represented here..
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February 23, 2013 at 7:34 AM
Its been extremely well shot…
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February 22, 2013 at 1:21 PM
Rajeev Masand 4/5 Stars
Its title derived from that cry of victory yelled out when an opponent has been defeated in a kite flying challenge, ‘Kai Po Che’ translates literally as “Gotcha!” An apt expression, perhaps, to describe the home run director Abhishek Kapoor delivers through this moving film about a friendship challenged by real-life tragedies.
http://ibnlive.in.com/news/kai-po-che-review-its-only-february-but-one-of-the-years-best-films-has-arrived/374575-47-84.html
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February 23, 2013 at 1:43 AM
It seems both the films had similar collections, 3.75 crores. KPC did better in multiplexes in mumbai circle. And ZG did better in single screens in the north.
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February 23, 2013 at 6:21 AM
ZG is receiving negative reviews(some called it garbage) while KPC is receiving positive reviews.
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February 23, 2013 at 7:16 AM
Just put my review up now guys, KAI PO CHE is an excellent film. Still absorbing the film, and one I will certainly watch again before the year ends, but nonetheless a very important film with some stunning performance. Raj Kumar Yadav is one to watch out for. Whilst ROCK ON! left me with a “feel good” feeling at the end of movie, KAI PO CHE left a lingering effect…….PARZANIA, FIRAAQ and DEV all touched on similar themes in different ways. The last 30 minutes, whilst you know where its heading, is still brilliantly shot.
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February 23, 2013 at 7:28 AM
Satyam: Re the email, I changed email addresses and dont have your old email on hand. Can you flick me a note on prazhari@gmail.com?
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February 23, 2013 at 8:05 AM
Hey maan–no ‘networking’ here !!!
This exchange of emails etc in this khan-type Satyam scenario hehe joking …
Btw wont /can’t watch this one –since not showing v near me–& I usually dont go out d the way for my films …
But–
The positive reports can’t be ignored…
And another angle that can’t/shouldn’t be
Missed is the involvement of chetan bhagat…
Haven’t /won’t read this book but how much is the book and how much is the director ..
A similar ‘debate’ I had with someone about life of pi and yann martels book…
And this also brings to focus his involvement since even in 3idiots there was this controversy which seemed to be suppressed by aamir (as usual) –rememener this ‘common theme’ from tzp with gupte, peepli with that woman etc
Ps: haven’t read any of chetan bhagat ‘novels’–(& nor would I read em)
But any input from bhagat ‘fans’ will be useful on this angle 🙂
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February 23, 2013 at 8:10 AM
Zilla Ghaziabad First Day Business
Saturday 23rd February 2013 10.00 IST
Boxofficeindia.Com Trade Network
Zilla Ghaziabad collected a poor 3.50 crore nett on day one with only single screens doing a bit better. The collections of the film were better in UP, Bihar, CP Berar, CI and Rajasthan with a lacklustre performance across all metros.
The film had a fairly wide release and as the first day recorded poor occupancies the film will struggle for growth on Saturday and if the growth does materialise it will be well short of what the film will need.
In the mass belts like UP, Bihar, CPCI and Rajasthan where Zilla Ghaziabad had comparatively better collections the collections were double of Kai Po Che but much lower than Kai Po Che in the metros especially Mumbai, Pune and Bangalore.
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February 23, 2013 at 8:10 AM
Kai Po Che Day One Business
Saturday 23rd February 2013 10.30 IST
Boxofficeindia.Com Trade Network
Kai Po Che collected a decent 3.75 crore nett on day one as it fared pretty well in metros. The collections were decent as the film had a limited release at many places and no known faces in the film.
The film did its best business in Mumbai and Mysore. The collections were decent in Delhi but that countered by the poor collections in UP, it was a similar story in East Punjab where Gurgaon was decent but the rest of the circuit poor. Central India also did not fare well.
The film should show growth on Saturday especially as the areas it is doing better in tend to have very good business on Saturday. Overall the film will depend on what sort of numbers it can get in metros over the long run.
The biggest plus is the film can do very well in Mumbai circuit as it is class appealing film so Mumbai city can score and a Gujarat setting should help in Gujarat enabling the film to have the two biggest components on Mumbai circuit on side.
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February 23, 2013 at 8:29 AM
Abhishek Bachchan @juniorbachchan
Although very flattered by the interest certain directors are showing . The only 2 films I’m doing right now are Dhoom3 and Dostana2.
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February 23, 2013 at 8:29 AM
this means that Dostana 2 is probably going before the Umesh Shukla film which wasn’t supposed to start before mid-year or something. This probably makes the Do aur Do Paanch deal more questionable at this point. Because it couldn’t begin before next year at the earlier. All for the good as far as I’m concerned! Of course I continue to maintain my resistance to Dostana 2! LOL, Abhishek’s putting himself in a position where neither fans like myself nor his worst detractors will get what they want out of him. The fans won’t get the serious stuff and the detractors will have to live through box office success! Man, I liked the old equation better..!
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February 23, 2013 at 11:50 AM
of course he hasn’t talked about the Farah Khan film either. which too I’d be happy about if he never did!
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February 23, 2013 at 8:37 AM
typo in my comment above on chetan bhagat—
“khap type” not ‘khan type” in thei think given the circumstances, it IS a good deal for abhi shrek! lately satyam is getting khap-ish tendencies hahaa
as for dostana 2!
with dhoom 3 and dostana 2, he has atleast one and a half sure shot box offcie winners!
He NEEDS box office ‘muscle’ to leverage his choices later on..
ps–think finally he is learning from his failures…
and learning to take charge of his career (finally)
ps2–the omg guy film still irks me—didnt mind omg but that director seemed from an older school of film making (and perhaps fit for tv serials lol)
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February 23, 2013 at 12:16 PM
it means Happy New year and Umesh Shuklas projects which he is doing for sure, pushed after dostana 2… i believe Junior is not doing right moves, happy new year after dostana 2 will not be a smart move, he will become Shashi Kapoor…. he need to act in Businessman OR Umesh Shuklas Project or any other solo hero project after dhoom 3 or atleast after dostana 2 not happy new year with SRK.
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February 23, 2013 at 12:24 PM
Only the Shukla project seems pretty sure because both the director and producer have confirmed it and have talked about completing the script over the next few months. Even here it’s not a 100% because Abhishek would otherwise have mentioned this too. On Happy New Year though no one has mentioned him in this context. The speculation seems strong but nonetheless there is no confirmation from anyone involved. My own sense following all of this is that Shukla’s film is next up after Dostana.
What is clear is that barring the obvious Dhoom he’s erring on the side of comedy in every one of his films. There are easy box office numbers here so I don’t blame him but there can be too much of a good thing. Because even the rumored films all seem to belong to this genre. I also think he’s probably not agreed to dramas at this point because there was the Dhulia rumor as well as the Ekta Kapoor one. The problem is that even if solely for commercial reasons there should be more of a mix because if you associate yourself with lighter fare you might get a lot of box office success but that too can become a mixed blessing inasmuch as the audience then might not want the more serious stuff from him at all. I suspect he’s just trying to wipe out all memory of some of the films that didn’t work because these did have him mostly in serious parts. Hence if he did serious an audience would potentially be reminded of those films and be more skeptical. Having said that comedy whether in its masala manifestation or otherwise rules the roost anyway, doesn’t take rocket science to figure this out. But it can be dangerous if indulged in too often, i.e. if one wishes to do better stuff down the line.
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February 23, 2013 at 12:43 PM
Three friends share same geographical space and co exist during same period, in history, but they live in their own distinctive worlds. Their worlds are products of their idiosyncratic proclivities and passions. Due to their long years of friendship and common goal to make a decent living their worlds converge into genial camaraderie. But as time passes the inherent differences in their disposition starts showing up as cracks in their bond and eventually relationship gets acrimonious. Vicissitudes of history then goads their worlds to confront each other till they find themselves on ominous discomforting crossroads.
Koi Po Che is a well crafted portrayal of their three worlds, their mutual interplay and influence of tumultuous history on the trajectory of these individuals. It generously invests in its three protagonists, builds their characters and finds befitting actors to do this job. You know them like you know your neighbour. It then weaves these three strands on a carefully tailored backdrop, delicately, into a delectable tapestry.
The movie had smell of contemporary India; both its fragrance and stench. It revolves on cricket and communalism. Both evoke strong passions but it does not ‘use’ them as movie’s selling point. They do not make the movie relevant but as they are relevant, by themselves, and punctuate the storyline, so they find place in the movie. It brings out how young, aspirational, India is willing to cut corners to fulfill its dreams and the dejection that ensue on its failure. Some of the hackneyed but pertinent issues like conflicts because of generational gap and emotive disconnect between the between traditional and modern etcetera are touched in the movie but deft handling ensures they don’t turn into a cliché.
It is reminiscent of Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi primarily because of style of novel like narrative; steady pace of events inching towards a climax with a sure footed gait. But what makes this movie stand out from the crowd it is the ability to make an unusual fiction look real, to make incredible sound authentic, to transmute unbelievable into believable.
Koi Po Che has its share of technical ‘hits and misses’ that would not go unnoticed under a well lit scanner. But I would like part with my fine tooth, analytical, proof-reader so as not to miss the forest for the trees. It is a wholesome cinematic experience not just because it tells a story worth telling but, more so, because it is story well told.
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February 23, 2013 at 12:54 PM
just read this line and was well worth it–“But I would like part with my fine tooth, analytical, proof-reader so as not to miss the forest for the trees.” ha
btw arpanam–are u into hardcore ‘spiritualism’ …if so would like to learn more from u….
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February 23, 2013 at 1:30 PM
aa,
I have had interest in spirituality since past few years and do devote devote some my quality time towards it.
Typo:” But I would like TO part with my fine tooth, analytical, proof-reader so as not to miss the forest for the trees.”
I should have proofread my review if not the movie.
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February 23, 2013 at 1:38 PM
Thanx arpanam
Just checked your website–some lovely divine thoughts
Can u plz summarise for us mere mortals what u learnt during these few years in spirituality
Would be more useful than a review of Kai po che–@ least for me …
Ps: I do understand its difficult to summarise that –but reading sleek thoughts on your site –I thought perhaps u could simplify things for me -perhaps … Lol
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February 23, 2013 at 2:03 PM
aa,
as you have pointed out it not easy to summarize a sizable body of thought. On the site the essays looks heavy because of nature of the subject is such that even a simple elucidation appears terse.Further simplification would be at cost of making it simplistic and therefore be unfair to the subject.
If you want specific clarification then you voice them in arpanam it self. In any case all the essays there are responses to queries on spirituality.
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February 23, 2013 at 2:21 PM
@ Arpanam sir/madam-
Many Thanx for those lovely q/a– may need to immerse in them when time is appropriate..
& Thanx to Satyam thru whom I come across lovely folks across the world 24×7– I suspect u r somewhere around UP, India but I can already feel your good (mental) vibrations here.
That’s the power of www.
Was this available earlier-no, but who can discount the presence of some other form of ‘channeling’ earlier existed and then got lost with increased ‘corruption’ of minds (& bodies)
Ps2:
Good point about issue with ‘simplification’-but I differ–I think soemtimes it IS essential to make stuff accessible & at level to other humans
Ps3: nice point oj your site about ‘those with increased reliance about their intellect..’
hahaa
Ps4: who are YOUR current favourite actors ad actresses in india/world cinema …
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February 23, 2013 at 3:20 PM
“This scepticism is more is in those who have unreasonable reliance on their intellect and are obstinate about accepting anything that is not perceived by the senses. They want evidence and there is none. Their egos are stubborn and somehow feel by accepting the principle they would be either irrational or servile. They want things to move in what they call as rational but the Laws of Nature don’t fall in their paradigm of rationality. ”
arpanam uncle/aunty….thanx for exposing me to such good stuff.
WIth due respect though-The basic fallacy here is that these ‘arrogant’ folks are usually taught from childhood an ‘evidence-based approach’ esp those who are taught/exposed to ‘science’.
All around we are expected to believe in ‘reality’ and infact there are real repercussions for not doing that.
So either u have the ‘blind follower’ or the ‘thinking cynic’ who are clear…The rest fall into the ‘coridoor of uncertainity’!
By creating this world of apparent ‘mysticism’, one may appear other-worldy (& holier than thou) but the absence of any visible sign/ manifestation of these ‘invisible’ aspects does ‘alienate’ such thinking from the mainstream.
In other words, there IS a need to talk in lay-man language in a conversational tone i think..
Also the need to create simpler allegorical associations that can be identified in real life.
ps–besides that, one may not find a dearth of those worshipping the likes of tarantino, even mani ratnam and other such ‘intellgent’ stuff, but folks feel a bit ‘uncomfortable’ associating with spirituality (atleast externally). These things dont appear ‘cool’.
Thats perhaps the bane of society and we all are guilty of that (more so folks like me) 🙂
ps2–i also noted how the other day there was an explosion killing many in south india. While many commented around it, only a few expressed regret about it.
Some may have missed it though…
Some are usually quite vocal about ‘human rights’ and ‘secularism’ etc otherwise
I mean, a kid who gets killed in a bomb blast–does he/she have no ‘human rights’ or ‘right to survive’.
Why this ‘selective silence’?
Also there seem some who confuse/associate ‘spirituality’ with ‘religion’..
Disclaimer-this is not a reflection on anyone but a spontaneous comment on the state we are in currently
time to get down from my (self-styled) high horse now ..and try to do some work…lol
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February 23, 2013 at 9:02 PM
aa / aa95, some interesing observations, I need to spare some time from my packed Sunday/Monday to discuss them. So give me some time.Regards.
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February 24, 2013 at 10:32 AM
“aa / aa95, some interesing observations, I need to spare some time from my packed Sunday/Monday to discuss them. So give me some time.Regards.”
@ arpanam uncle/aunty–
No problems, plz take your time…
btw went through a bit more of your site and can only thank u more for teaching such good things.
btw my ‘diagnosis’ is that you are a doctor–do tell me if im right.
ps–while u are at it–plz do tell me what u think is the ‘purpose of life’–know its a gross and heavy question, but i think u are well-equipped (much more than us) to tackle it in a lucid succinct manner…thanx
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February 25, 2013 at 12:19 PM
aa
At the outset I am not sure if this forum is appropriate to discuss such matters. I don’t follow the discussions here regularly and therefore am not aware of the scope of this blog and moderator’s philosophy. However since you raised some genuinely valid points I have responded to them:.
“btw my ‘diagnosis’ is that you are a doctor–do tell me if im right.
folks are usually taught from childhood an ‘evidence-based approach’ esp those who are taught/exposed to ‘science’.”
“This scepticism is more ….thanx for exposing me to such good stuff..”
Spot on. I am in diagnostician in allopathic medicine. But it’s not your laudable detective prowess that is that is pertinent, here, but that arpanam can find place among those category of folks with ‘evidence-based approach’. As any diagnosis in allopathic medicine should based on evidence and be devoid of any speculative reasoning.
However evidence is modern science is based primarily on two modalities: perception and inference. Various branches of Indian philosophy viz. Sankhya, Vedanta, Nyaya, Bhuddhism etc increases the number of modalities and there relative emphasis therefore its concussion about reality differ. The quote that had elicited your response was provided to a Buddhist and to drive home a point regarding there inability to comprehend Vedic epistemology.
“By creating this world of apparent ‘mysticism’, one may appear other-worldy (& holier than thou) but the absence of any visible sign/ manifestation of these ‘invisible’ aspects does ‘alienate’ such thinking from the mainstream.”
All around we are expected to believe in ‘reality’ and infact there are real repercussions for not doing that.
Also the need to create simpler allegorical associations that can be identified in real life.”
World is perceived by the senses and through the intellect its nature is ascertained. That is evidence based rational thinking. If something exists that can be perceived by the senses then it would be speculative conclude anything about it in absence of any visible signs. There is no question of alienation here . This is transactional reality.
Now the experience of you existence is self evident. It is not dependent on your senses nor on you thinking for validation. However when someone doen’t see this simple fact and validate you existence in conjugation with things that are evident thru the senses, or say silly things like “I think therefore I exist”, he makes an error. To correct this error there is place if thinking in spirituality. On correction of this error, the reality of everything that is perceived through senses, though we are expected to believe it’s true, still stands negated. Negated as a fact, because it was negatable not because I wish to it be so. This is ontological reality.
When transactional is mixed with ontological mysticism and other worldly theories crop up which fail to stand logical scrutiny. This happens especially when people create simplified allegorical associations. Yes this has its set of repercussions, grave repercussions. IMHO most of the havoc that religion has leased is partly because of this simplification done of various religious texts by their interlocutor.
“issue with ‘simplification’-but I differ–I think sometimes it IS essential to make stuff accessible & at level to other humans”
In other words, there IS a need to talk in lay-man language in a conversational tone i think..”
Yes even the highly profound thoughts should be voiced in simplest of the language and style. As the purpose of saying anything is for the other to understand. However when the profundity is compromised to make it accessible to ‘other’ humans there is grave risk of misinterpretation. When the issue is complex the language invariably gets terse and there is risk of non comprehension. Later is less perilous than the former. Non comprehension there is acceptance of the deficit and thereby a regular attempt ensues to get at the bottom of the matter. In misinterpretation one is complacent of his error as he thinks he has understood the subject. And for correct learning he has to go through twofold process, viz, unlearning and relearning.
I would provide an illustration to validate my point. Various website that give simplified version of medical science, every second person, on click of button, is able to access and have an opinion about his medical problem. As a diagnostician I find it lot more easy to convince the diagnosis of the medical problem, to a computer illiterate than to those alec smart, who have gained some information and worse, are confident about their conclusions.
Try making it lucid it ceases to be what it inherently is. How many physicists, leave alone scientists, can comprehend some of Einstein’s laws of relativity? And how many Khyaal gayaks, leave alone musicians, can appreciate Dhrupad? Making them simplified then they may be able to comprehend and appreciate something but what they appreciate would not be Einstein’ law of Dhrupad.
This may sound elitist but I say this with utter humility that only a small section of humanity can come upon true vision of what is indicated through spiritual pointers.
So either u have the ‘blind follower’ or the ‘thinking cynic’ who are clear…The rest fall into the ‘coridoor of uncertainity’!
At the core of this problem is how belief /faith is understood. Belief is not is at contradiction with rational thinking. Rather it finds place where an experience cannot be comprehended by use of logic. It also provides an opportunity to eventually comprehend what may not be comprehendible right now. By accepting a possibility, one can pursue the possibility, till it gets verifiable, experientially.
Therefore, belief is not blind. The reason why thinking mind gets cynical is because one does not permit any other explanation that can throw light on their seemingly contradictory experiential understanding. So true clarity can dawn on those that fall in “corridors of uncertainty” remain humble, till they know the distinct place of belief and reason, in scheme of things.
“besides that, one may not find a dearth of those worshipping the likes of tarantino,”
Very true, man is essentially and believer / follower. What he/she worships is what differs but not the fact of worshipping. Either it is pulp fiction or divine fiction. True sceptics and unswerving believers are rare, majority oscillates between the two as per convenience. And it is this rare soul that can crack the mystery of creation.
“also noted how the other day there was an explosion
Why this ‘selective silence’?”
I could not figure out how was this relevant to this discussion. Anyway I can find no reason (Afzal etc) for not finding this heinous act, deplorable. I had voiced my dissent at an appropriate forum.
“Also there seem some who confuse/associate ‘spirituality’ with ‘religion’”
Though the definition of these two terms and their connotation are not well defined, however going with the conventional meaning, they are distinct pursuits. And there is always a possibility for this confusion of this to happen. Association between the two is extremely complex and its elucidation is beyond the scope of this discussion.
“while u are at it–plz do tell me what u think is the ‘purpose of life’ in a lucid succinct manner”
Completely eradicate any sense of incompleteness with its ramification (sorrow, fear, conflict etc) that one invariably experiences. Imputing any other purpose to life is error .Though every soul works towards it , knowing and unknowingly, most do it the wrong way , primarily by seeking short lived gratification and the fundamental problem remains unresolved .
“who are YOUR current favourite actors ad actresses in india/world cinema …”
I can’t put my finger on one or few who have been consistently good actor/actress. One reason is that most actors don’t exercise discretion in choosing the roles and it gets tough to differentiate a good actor’s acting abilities in bad role. As a director I find Dibakar Banerjee brilliant. I in my reckoning he stands out. All the four films he has directed viz KKG,OLLO,LSD and Shangai were consistently good. LSD, however, was exceptionally good.
MCQ “Arpanam is : uncle/aunty/sir/madam”
To reduce your options: arpanam’s chromosomal status is 46XY; so that rules out two. His biological age is 38 yrs. You can compute temporal parallax, vis-à-vis your age , match it in your culturally tinged ready reckoner, and come up with a scientific, evidence based nomenclature.
aa, now that you have, by your incredible diagnostics, and have spilled the beans and brought it in open, the most well kept secret, that arpanam is a doctor. Arpnam Uncle will take the liberty of giving you a medical tip; there is some nutritive value in what arpanam has said, which can nourish you, if you chew and not regurgitate, after it is consumed. It’s possible that you may have further question. However I will not engage into dialectics, any further, as over the years , I have realised how unproductive is polemics. Dialogue is different ball game and cannot take place on web based forums. If your questions are backed with genuine yearning and not mere intellectual curiosity, you will find appropriate answers.
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February 25, 2013 at 3:46 PM
Yo arpanam -that’s a nice delicious comment-firstly hope u had a comfy sun:mon Oncall
Will read this properly later
Though it doesn’t seem so-I also do some work and am bl..dy stuck in some deluge
Will be bak
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February 25, 2013 at 7:43 PM
Arpanam uncle (u r not that older but ‘wisdom’ wise still deserve that epithet lol)
I’m too ‘spent’ rite now and will get bak to this ‘serious’ topic at an apt time.
At the mo-my minds numb n tired –only ‘basal’ thoughts ok
Btw noted u seem obsessed with dibaker -who has yet to make a non-Delhi environ film work…Who are the heroines u like ?
Ps: like your answer on the ‘purpose of life’ and will read properly later.
As of now..
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February 25, 2013 at 8:29 PM
Yeah.. As of now I much prefer to ‘play’ with anya darling than u 😉
Ps: will carry on this later –don’t u worry
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February 23, 2013 at 10:49 PM
Saw Kai Po Che last night and absolutely loved it. Will try and watch it again sometime next week. Really liked this and personally prefer this to 3I. Do not miss this one guys
One of my favourite actors from the new breed, Rajkumar Yadav has come up with a crackling performance. And this is Amit Trivedi’s best soundtrack since Udaan. The BGM by Hitesh Sonik is remarkable
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February 24, 2013 at 4:30 AM
and isnt it mere coincidence, both 3I and KPC are adapted from Chetan Bhagat novel…
Next is 2 States starring your fav Alia 😉
I believe Five Point Someone and 3 Mistakes of My Life, are probably best work by Bhagat.
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February 23, 2013 at 11:58 PM
Kai Po Che has registered massive growth in collections on Saturday at the box office. It has collected around 6 crore nett all India on Saturday as per estimates. Kai Po Che has registered a growth of around 40-45% on Saturday from Friday. Jump is huge because Kai Po Che already had a very good Friday. Kai Po Che Two days collection now stands at 10.25 crore nett.
Kai Po Che should show again huge jump on Sunday specially in metro centers. Film is released in around 900 screens all India. On Saturday it registered an occupancy of around 70% which is big considering film has no significant star. Kai Po Che is heading for a big weekend and huge Hit at the box office.
addatoday
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February 24, 2013 at 5:08 AM
http://www.thehindu.com/features/cinema/film-review-kai-po-che-no-mistakes-our-life/article4446273.ece
The true triumph of a film is how it makes you feel, when you leave, when you look back at it and when it refuses to leave you long after you’ve seen it.
Kai Po Che will leave you choked and feeling good. It will leave you bittersweet. And breathless.
Go watch it. Again and again.
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February 24, 2013 at 6:24 AM
If it is as good as they say, one cant forget contribution of Bhagat.
And if it is as good, it should be India’s Oscar nomination imo.
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February 24, 2013 at 6:29 AM
Karan Johar i feel can learn a thing or too from movies like Kai Po Che… infront of this his Student of the year looks too bad…
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February 24, 2013 at 10:39 AM
no way rooney – he would say patang wala kite? 🙂 (ishq wala love……)
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February 24, 2013 at 8:33 AM
Kai Po Che Good Growth Zilla Ghaziabad Down
Sunday 24th February 2013 14.30 IST
Boxofficeindia.Com Trade Network
Kai Po Che showed good growth on Saturday as it collected around 5.50 crore nett taking the two day total to around 9.50 crore nett. The film showed huge 80-100% jumps across all metros though in other areas the jump was less at 20-30%. the film should show good growth again and gross 16 crore nett plus over the weekend.
Zilla Ghaziabad went down on Saturday grossing in the 2.75-3 crore nett range giving it a two day total of 6.25-6.50 crore nett. the film was down practically all over India with some places down by 30%. The weekend will around 10 crore nett for Zilla Ghaziabad as Sunday will not be much more than Friday.
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February 24, 2013 at 8:34 AM
taran adarsh @taran_adarsh
#KaiPoChe Fri 4.5 cr, Sat 6.25 cr. Biz doubles in Kolkata, Bangalore, Mumbai, Pune, Delhi. Huge growth at other places. Expect a massive Sun
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February 24, 2013 at 10:08 AM
looks like a 30-35 cr week – pretty good considering the budget?
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February 24, 2013 at 11:20 AM
“Lincoln is going in my second slot; it’s a bore, but it’s Spielberg, it’s well-meaning, and it’s important. Zero Dark Thirty is my No 1.”
hahaha…….inside the twisted mind of an oscar voter. confirms evertything i always suspected about oscars but he still sounds less senile than i imagine most of these cinema uncles to be.
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/race/oscar-voters-brutally-honest-ballot-422546
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February 24, 2013 at 12:58 PM
Sorry, meant to put this here-
I have been noticing this a lot that people (mostly in the West but sometimes even in India) think that they are being very smart when they make fun of Spielberg and De Palma. Some of these folks make such idiotic comments that the likes of Tarantino and Bigelow are better than them. God help such folks
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February 24, 2013 at 6:13 PM
the newer filmmakers don’t have enough of a body of work to make such judgments, only time will tell. spielberg on the other hand, despite being iconic in many ways and achieving technical brilliance, hasn’t made a ‘great’ film since close encounters of the third kind. his only great film in my opinion.
if people kept worshipping at his feet without giving new talent their due, things will get stale. at some point, even spielberg can’t rest on his laurels and people move on. he is already doing a lot of good tv work with hanks and branching out. i think that’s smart.
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February 24, 2013 at 10:14 PM
Antya, quite frankly I am stunned that you do not find Raiders, Schindler’s List Jurassic Park and SPR as great films. It’s not a question of personal choice here- these films are considered as ‘great films’ by all reputed magazines, critics and institutes.
On the other hand till now Tarantino has made only one great film- Pulp Fiction.
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February 24, 2013 at 10:19 PM
Oh and I forgot to add E.T. to the list. Do think you are right that he has not made a great film since SPR though Lincoln may become one. Among his works from the past 10 yrs or so, the one I like the most is Munich followed by Minority Report and Tintin
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February 24, 2013 at 10:35 PM
who considers jurassic park a great film? they need their head examined, i could help them. these are big, well-done blockbusters. good entertaining films, yes. but great? i’d rate jaws above those actually. and i fu***ng hate ET.
i liked munich.
tarantino has made no great films. a bunch of really entertaining exciting films that push the envelope and have repeat value for me. i have never been tempted to watch a spielberg film twice, except close encounters. and he hasn’t made anything worthwhile lately.
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February 24, 2013 at 11:32 AM
hahaha anya u made my day.
‘django unchained’ as ‘tarantino masturbating’ 🙂
and ‘argo’ as a ‘whole lot of nothing’!!!
exactly right…(thats y never felt like catching afflecks much delayed ‘coming of age’ deals)
anyhow–agree theres a lot of ‘politicising’ & ‘posturing’ in these choices (both domestic n international)–& the ‘old boys club’ deal!
uve reminded me–isnt the awards today? heck–who all are checking it!
so any final guesses satyam and others-
best film, director, actor, actress….(what dya think folks)
ps–not lookin 4warward to seth macfarlane..isnt he the damn host?
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February 24, 2013 at 6:21 PM
yes, the awards are tonight, will be watching. mostly for the fashions, faux pas’s (non existent plural!) and most of all seth macfarlane. i hope he doesn’t sanitize it too much and makes fun of this self-congratulatory crowd.
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February 24, 2013 at 7:13 PM
ha but seems i will have to miss it–will be stuck in some mates’ party! may try to catch bits but seems difficult
anya–plz do give a juicy update …thanx
as for the results– DDL seems a surety. For those like bradley cooper & jen lawrence, nomination IS the award..lol
as for the ‘fashion’-
heck–just saw the ‘blue rinse’ hairstyle of kelly osborne–yuck..
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February 24, 2013 at 11:42 AM
“I rule out Christoph Waltz because this is a fake nomination — he’s a co-lead with Jamie Foxx, and it’s unfair for the others to compete with that. Also, much of his performance is just like in Inglourious Basterds. Robert De Niro was just Robert De Niro; yes, he had one crying scene, but crying is not enough.”
hahaha ROFL
ps-btw they HAVE TO give it to chastain –JUST bcos she reminded me of my mom in tree of life—THATS it!!
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February 24, 2013 at 12:24 PM
i watched the telugu film “Eega” (dubbed in hindi as makhkhi) – thoroughly entertaining and if you see its b.o. record – well it can give a run for money to any superhit bw film…check this:
Eaga First Day Collection All over India Approx- 11 Crores
Eega movie Second day collections: 11.5 Crores
Eega movie 3rd day collections: 10.5 Crores
Eega movie 4th day collections: 10 Crores
Eega movie 5th day collections: 10.2 Crores
Eega movie 6th day collections: 10.0 Crores
Eega movie 7th day collections: 10.3 Crores
Eega movie 8th day collections: 9 Crores
Eega movie 9th day collections: 8.3 Crores
Eega movie 10th day collections: 7.5 Crores
Eega movie 11th day collections: 7.4 Crores
Eega movie 12th day collections: 6.8 Crores
Eega movie 13th day collections: 5.5 Crores
Eega movie 14th day collections: 5.2 Crores
Eega movie 15th day collections: 5.0 Crores
Eega movie 16th day collections: 4.2 Crores
Eega movie 17th day collections: 3.8 Crores
Eega movie 18th day collections: 3.5 Crores
Eega movie 19th day collections: 3.4 Crores
Eega movie 20th day collections: 3.0 Crores
Eega movie 21st day collections: 2.95 Crores
Eega movie 22nd day collections: 2.90 Crores
Eega movie 23rd day collections: 2.89 Crores
Eega movie 24rd day collections: 2.80 Crores
Eega movie 25th day collections: 2.00 Crores
Eega movie 26th day collections: 1.82 Crores
Eega movie 27th day collections: 2.00 Crores
Eega movie 28th day collections:1.80 Crores
Eega movie 29th day collections:1.72 Crores
Eega movie 30th day collections:1.20 Crores
Eega movie 31 day collections:1.00 Crores
Eega movie 32 day collections:0.90 Crores
Eega movie 33 day collections:0.72 Crore
Eega movie 34 day collections:0.76 Crore
Eega movie 35 day collections:0.67 Crore
Eega movie 36 day collections:0.45 Crore
Eega movie 37 day collections:0.55 Crores
Eega movie 38 day collections:0.40 Crores
Eega movie 39 day collections:0.32 Crores
Eega movie 40 day collections:0.20 Crores
Eega movie 41 day collections:0.16 Crores
Eega movie 42 day collections:0.12 Crores
Eega movie 43 day collections:0.10 Crores
Eega movie 44 day collections:0.06 Crores
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February 24, 2013 at 12:29 PM
http://www.superwoods.com/news-id-eega-nan-e-19-08-122672.htm
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February 24, 2013 at 12:38 PM
Its a very good movie. Eaga, the mosquito had a personality of its own and Sudeep has to contend with it!
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February 24, 2013 at 12:45 PM
rangan’s review on eega was a delight…..most of the country’s leading critics have given 3 or higher to this movie – i simply enjoyed it – expected nothing out of it….really sudeep is a fantastic actor – i wonder why he hasn’t entered bw yet?
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February 24, 2013 at 12:56 PM
Bollywood generally does not encourage male artists from south. At the most they get secondary roles and disappear after a while. Even if they speak the language well. It is better they do good roles in their own states than to do insignificant roles in BW. The same way BW stars are sidelined in Hollywood.
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February 24, 2013 at 1:03 PM
I am so glad that you liked Eega. The film really needs more patronage. And Rangan was characteristically fantastic in his review
On Sudeep, he was quite the showstealer in RGV’s Rann. And he was there in Phoonk as well as RC
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February 24, 2013 at 2:19 PM
Saw ‘Kai Po Che’ this morning. A very impressive film. Up there among the best male bonding Indian films ever: Dil Chataq Hai, 3 Idiots, Rang De Basanti, Rock On, Zindagi Na MIlega Dobara… and in some ways marks a natural progression from all the films that came before it. It is such a perfectly realized film that its merits are there for all to see: a masterly control in storytelling bringing out the nuances of the three characters with clarity and subtlety, the treatment of politically sensitive issues of communal tension and political expediency with maturity and restraint without avoiding them, the great use of music, and finally the brilliant casting and performances by the three protagonists.
What impressed me most , and rate it above the other male-bonding films mentioned, is that the story here is told with all seriousness without resorting to gags-laden jokey style or the fantasy or outlandish devices like in 3 Idiots or ZNMD that are used to make those films more accessible. The happenings here even when dramatic are entirely plausible and possible in the contexts they happen. The film is refreshing in its natural storytelling and so many scenes stand out for masterly staging. I especially loved the Govind and Vidya track… the depiction of their romance rates up there along with the one in Cocktail as among the most perceptive in recent times. Chetan Bhagat writes sex well…without prudery prurience. His male and female characters treat sex as a natural part of their relationship, without awkwardness or guilt, with passion and tenderness. I was most angry with Hirani for making the relationship between Rancho and Priya all vegetarian and cutting out the funny yet natural making-out scene between the two ending with Rancho ( actually Ryan in the book) escaping in the professors shirt …it was so hilarious! The lovemaking scene here built up from the lyrical Pari Hoon Mein dandiya sequence, and the aftermath of tension-filled talk in the auto to the message delivered on mixed up cellphone were very charming. Thank god there was no Mani Ratnam style attempt at elaborately choreographed dances ( The Dandiya sequence offered such a low hanging fruit of an excuse) . But the songs by Amit Trivedi are top class and are integrated very well into the narrative.
Everyone is gushing about Sushnat Singf Rajput and he WAS good. But it is Raj Kumar Yadav whose character and performance were the more nuanced . There is not much happening here in way of ‘story’ and thank god for that again – no outlandish twists and turns. What takes home from the film is a great tale f human relationship involving relatable characters , encrusted with many moving sequences. A film like this delivers the message on the futility and tragedy of aggressive communalism far more effectively than a Perzania or any of the other more explicitly political film do. For me the other high point was the relationship between Ishann and Ali, the kind of which s rarely seen in a Hindi film.
And yes, the film doe send with a stylish sign off that is so crisp, smart and elegant that many of our more celebrated directors could as well learn from it. So happy that the faith I had in Abhishek Kapoor after Rock On has been so grandly validated.
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February 24, 2013 at 6:57 PM
@ Utkal uncle—thanx for this take.
This is the first review of this film i have read (or will read now!) since it comes from u. I ‘value’ your reviews since they come ‘rinsed’ with your ‘experience’ & ‘wisdom’ …
“without resorting to gags-laden jokey style or the fantasy or outlandish devices like in 3 Idiots or ZNMD”–haha *though i didnt mind either or em
.
“the depiction of their romance rates up there along with the one in Cocktail as among the most perceptive in recent times. Chetan Bhagat writes sex well…without prudery prurience. His male and female characters treat sex as a natural part of their relationship, without awkwardness or guilt, with passion and tenderness.”
–good point about ‘cocktail’ & the ‘perceptive romance’ and full marx to the apt use of the term ‘prudery prurience’ here haha
The problem is 3i was also the ‘heroine’ and so it HAD to kept ‘vegetarian’…lol
finally –“Thank god there was no Mani Ratnam style attempt at elaborately choreographed dances ( The Dandiya sequence offered such a low hanging fruit of an excuse)”–hahaha
ps—with this film, it seems that bhagat DOES have a sense of the ‘pulse’ of the contemporary indian populace though he may not be great shakes as a writer. Those who have read his books maybe better judges…( i havent/wont but think credit is due)
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February 24, 2013 at 8:11 PM
Bhagat’s books are filmy. They are tailormade for films. I read his books only through these films.
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February 24, 2013 at 8:02 PM
Disappointed with KAI PO CHE..I JUST do not understand this lionization of Hindi movies that are even SLIGHTLY better than run-of-the-mill movies..
I think I will need to get my head examined because I am just not able to understand this media-orgasm — even Utkal here — about this movie..The movie is good..but the way it is being talked about..it is as though it is the next LAWRENCE OF ARABIA..
Will write about it if I feel like it…
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February 24, 2013 at 8:14 PM
Media has gone nuts. See the way it lionises films enmasse.
I stopped taking media and film critics seriously long back.
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February 24, 2013 at 8:31 PM
well, they have to. to make the rest of 95% crap looks worth it.
well. i am off to watch seth macfarlane.
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February 24, 2013 at 9:35 PM
an jo: frankly i’m very happy to read your comments eventhough i haven’t seent he movie yet! I really don’t have that gut-feeling abt this media’s “masterpiece has arrived” kind of praise for this film and finally there is someone who writes this – well i may change my opinion after i watch the movie and also satyam / gf / rooney (amdavadi lawyer 🙂 ) / Q and other respected members of this blog writes their views. Not to take away anything from other respected members who have written positive reviews abt the film – but i m little put-off when people are saying that it is better than 3i/dch etc. is it really that great? if yes – good for hindi cinema.
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February 24, 2013 at 9:49 PM
Dont worry. 3I,DCH,RDB have something that these films dont have. That something makes all the difference. 2 weeks back it was Special Chabbis which was the best film and now it is KPC and tomorrow they will forget these 2 and start going gaga over Nawajuddin or Rajkumar Yadav or Vidya film. Just watch the fun.
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February 24, 2013 at 9:49 PM
Add me to the list who have gone orgasmic over KPC.
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February 24, 2013 at 9:17 PM
AA: ” “without resorting to gags-laden jokey style or the fantasy or outlandish devices like in 3 Idiots or ZNMD”–haha *though i didnt mind either or em” I didn’t mind them either. In fact I loved these elements hugely. What I am saying is that in the context of Bollywood tradition and the popcorn munching multiplex audiences, holding that attention of the crowd without these crutches is creditable.
An Jo: ‘ it is as though it is the next LAWRENCE OF ARABIA..” No one is saying it is Lawrence of Arabia. The most that I haves aid is that ‘ it is up there with the best of male bonding movies that we have had.”
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February 25, 2013 at 2:11 AM
“holding that attention of the crowd without these crutches is creditable.”—
Agree with that, utkal uncle
If the film has done what u are saying it has, it is certainly creditable indeed
Ps: so u r saying this is better than 3i, znmd& even DCH– hmmm..
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February 24, 2013 at 10:18 PM
I saw some of these much hyped movies like Vicky Donor, Dhobi Ghat, Kahaani, English Vinglish, OMG, PST,GOW and fortunately missed Delhi Belly. The way they were hyped, I thought they will run forever in the theatres. But they folded up after 2 weeks! The hype for Special 26 was unbelievable. Maybe after watching crap movies, something reasonable makes these critics go gaga. It is a relative thing. The fact is our films do not have universal appeal in the real sense. We think we are the best and the big bad world does not recognise us. For us it is fine and we should be content with it. We thought Lagaan was the best and when it did not win, it was funny to notice the collective sigh of unhappiness in some quarters and happiness in some other quarters. And sending Barfi in a hurry without even considering other films and facing flak of its being heavily plagiarised.
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February 25, 2013 at 12:06 AM
“I thought they will run forever in the theatres. But they folded up after 2 weeks”
in a lighter vein – in this age of 2000/3000 screen release: 2 weeks = forever (means more than 50 cr) 🙂
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February 25, 2013 at 12:10 AM
“I thought they will run forever in the theatres. But they folded up after 2 weeks” films like Kahaani, Vicky donor, English Vinglish, OMG, Barfi had among the longest runs in recent years. That’s how they got to the kind of totals they got, starting with relatively low opening.
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February 25, 2013 at 12:20 AM
I did not include Barfi which is a clean hit.
English Vinglish was such an ordinary movie hyped to the heavens. And its returns were also not that great for all that hype.
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February 25, 2013 at 12:22 AM
But sending Barfi for Oscars was just over the top.
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February 25, 2013 at 12:28 AM
English Vinglish was among the most subtle and perfectly crafted stories in recent times, posturing small nuances that make human relationships so fascinating. Sridevi gave a bravura performance, one of the best by an actress in recent times. and it was hugely successful for the makers with the entire cost b being recovered from the non-theatrical revenues.
I did not include Barfi which is a clean hit.
Films like Kahaani and Vicky Donor are clean ‘ super hits.’ And I thought we were talking about how good the good films are, and not about they being clean or unclean hits!
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February 25, 2013 at 12:35 AM
The hype is not only about how good these films are but also hinted at huge bo success,
English Vinglish is nothing but a tv soap opera like balika vadhu. As if human relationships were never portrayed like this. Remember Anuradha, Charulata, Anubhav etc.
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February 25, 2013 at 12:39 AM
And Sridevi is over the top actress. Subtlety was never her forte.
Her acting is in the face never leaving for any imagination on the viewers part.
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February 25, 2013 at 1:07 AM
Sanjana: Remember Anuradha, Charulata, Anubhav etc.?
Of clourse I do. And how many years back was that?
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February 25, 2013 at 5:19 AM
It does not matter. Because these types of relationships are explored often in many regional films and also bollywood films more realistically.
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February 25, 2013 at 2:17 AM
aa95: Ps: so u r saying this is better than 3i, znmd& even DCH– hmmm..
No. I am saying it is in the same bracket. Can’t say better,
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February 25, 2013 at 2:23 AM
How would u rank these films (in the same bracket)-Thanx
Another point is that kpc seems an official remake whilst 3i wasnt
There were murmurs of discontent there by bhagat –how much of there two films were the book..
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February 25, 2013 at 2:28 AM
Well, KPC is more or less faithful to the book apart from the last act and the climax. Bhagat himself has written the screenplay. In any case 3 Mistakes of My Life is the only Bhagat book I have liked somewhat
3I was loosely adapted with a lot of changes
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February 25, 2013 at 2:39 AM
Hmm then bhagat deserves LOT of credit
Also I have suspected that the ‘loose changes’ in 3i were
perhaps mainly to avoid sharin official credit with poor bhagat
This has been a common theme with aamir though after gupte, peepli
In dhobi ghat he couldn’t do this bcos of trouble @ home lol
Ps; havent read any bhagat novels
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February 25, 2013 at 2:44 AM
Ott–
An not intouch but saw a headline
MSDs double century after a crap start
That’s what I like about the guy
Average talent, above average application and superlative ‘heart’& guts!
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February 25, 2013 at 3:09 AM
Did not like Therons THIS look– c’mon WHY?
Anyhow liked her in aeon flux too recently
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2284017/Oscars-2013-Charlize-Theron-says-chopping-hair-freeing-thing-showing-impressive-dancing-skills-Oscars-2013-ceremony.html
Ps: I had a theron look alike teacher once …
Ok will stop there.. Need2sortsomethingnowlol
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February 25, 2013 at 3:10 AM
¬tyguys-she’s taking bout shaving her HEAD!!
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February 25, 2013 at 5:12 AM
Why to bring aamir everywhere? It is Hirani who did not want to share credit. Because he gave credit elsewhere and he modified the script with another writer. Which Chetan could not take it. Chetam’s hello did dismally and even KPC is not such a big shake at the BO.
Chetan knew all these facts and yet he wanted to go ahead and cry foul.
Only oldgold type will twist factors like this to discredit aamir and now my doubts have been confirmed.
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February 26, 2013 at 2:25 PM
bhagat’s books are certainly timepass when one is going for journey for timepass as they tend to finish quickly lol
found revolution 2020 is better than three mistakes of my life for a great masala grosser in terms of commerce not by literary standard
two guys who are opposite…a love traingle …corruption in politics and education and ultimate winning of human trumph
its an irony why haven’t anyone picked it up and its certainly better than three mistake or two states
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February 25, 2013 at 6:44 AM
Kai Po Che Weekend Business
Monday 25th February 2013 11.00 IST
Boxofficeindia.Com Trade Network
Kai Po Che grossed around 15.75 crore nett over its first weeeknd. The film had a pretty good start in metros on Friday and consolidated in these areas on Saturday and Sunday. Business outside the metros did pick up but as start was low the overall business also remained low. The approx breakdowns were 3.75 crore nett on Friday, 5.50 crore nett on Saturday and 6.50 crore nett on Sunday.
The weekend business of the film was similar to another non cast film ABCD – Anybody Can Dance released a few weeks back and the trend was also the same with Mumbai and South faring better but not quite to the extent of that film which was very lop sided.
The film grossed around 7.25 crore nett in Mumbai, 3.15 crore nett in Delhi/UP, 1.10 crore nett in East Punjab and 1.20 crore nett in Mysore.
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February 25, 2013 at 6:44 AM
Zilla Ghaziabad Weekend Business
Monday 25th February 2013 11.00 IST
Boxofficeindia.Com Trade Network
Zilla Ghaziabad grossed around 10 crore nett over its first weekend. The film had an average start at some single screens but could not hold these collections over the weekend. The multiplexes were dull at most places.
The film has little chance for even reasonable overall business as the weekend is too low for such a film. UP, Bihar, Rajasthan fared best for the film. The film grossed 3.75 crore nett in Mumbai, 2.15 crore nett in Delhi/UP, 65 lakhs nett in East Punjab and 80 lakhs nett in Rajasthan.
The film which is a 35-37 crore investment may not even collect a 10 crore all India distributor share from domestic theatrical collections.
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February 25, 2013 at 6:45 AM
Midweek: ‘Kai Po Che’ has terrific weekend!
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February 25, 2013 at 8:14 AM
aa95: “How would u rank these films (in the same bracket)…..–how much of there two films were the book..”
I would rate 3 Idiots higher than the rest for its tremendous inventiveness and great sense of humour that it delivers without losing the soul and the core message. And it is such a difficult subject to convey on film : the right attitude to education. Whoever thought one can make a blockbuster movie based on a theme lie that. Mind you right from the first sequence on the rooftop to the last sequence in Bhutan, and all the conflicts between Prof Viru and silencer on one hand and Ryan on the other is on this core issue and not something extraneous . A remarkable achievement indeed!
Next would be Dil Chahta Hai, Rang De Basanti , Rock On and Kai Po Che, all at the same level.
DCH for its remarkably youthful language and jaunty syntax. A great portrait of friendship between 3 very interesting characters with well-etched differences in attitude to life an d choice of female mates. Great Music.
RDB for its grand and ennobling theme. Again a very inventive script. A lot of soul and tremendous energy. Unformulaic narration. No standard romance track. Very creative use of music. A truly stirring film-viewing experience.
Rock On..for treating another subject that has never been handled at this level of seriousness…a musiuc band. The four characters again are very well-nuanced individuals. The process of music-making is believable and the sings rock. But what makes the film special, as always, is the human relationship drawn out of real life, lived in experiences, rather than filmy cliché. (The scene with Sahana Goswamy’s hand smelling of fish, her confrontation with Farhan over Arjun not being able to play..etc) . And the rousing climax concert is an all-out winner.
Kai Po Che..I have already put down why it works for me.
And ZNMD comes way below. Gerwat-looking film. Very urban humour. But a little less-rooted for my liking. And it is the film that has stayed in my mind the least.
Jai Po Che is quite faithful to the book. Only the film has improved it with more sophistication. Better filmmaking replacing the clunky writing. But the characters, the situations and the essential concerns are all in the Bhagat ‘s novel.
With 3 Idiots the departure in terms of the narrative is substantial. The whole Ranchod track is Hirani-Joshi invention. AS is the childbirth woth vacuum cleaner episode. And as are many gags including the brilliant Balatakar-Chamatakar speech. But here gain Bhagat’s contribution is substantial. The films could touch hearts because of the rootedness of the three characters and the middleclass background of Madhavan and Shraman. This as well as the central conflict are Bhagat’s creation. The character of Prof Viru, the business of his son’s suicide, the key narrative crux of stealing the question papers and being found out..are all there in Bhagat’s novel. Hirani has been unfair to Bhagat..Aamir does not have much to do with this. I have a feeling Hirani was uncharacteristically mean because he wanted to ensure that Joshi got enough credit for his contribution. Anyway I was not happy with his attitude in the whole episode. Saying that the novel was only 10% of the film was a blatant dishonest statement. But thanks to Bhagat’s protests through the press people got to know what is what. And now he ahs got a kind of comeuppance with a film that many may consider superior to 3 Idiots.
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February 25, 2013 at 12:36 PM
interestingly aamir is part of 3 such films now which are stories of 3 males-bonding – DCH/RDB/3I
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February 25, 2013 at 12:39 PM
wud it be fair to say that if aamir starred in KPC – the weekend bus wud be around 30-40-50 cr?
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February 26, 2013 at 1:01 AM
or if Salman was in it, 50-60-70?
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February 25, 2013 at 1:44 PM
Wow, I really thought KPC might really be agreat film based on Utkal’s review and then he mentioned Cocktail and I realised he is just taking a piss!
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February 25, 2013 at 8:26 PM
Thanx utkal uncle –lovely summation there –
I always discover something new from your comments..
I suspect u must be a ‘Casanova’ in your times eh-your ‘experience’ shows
I know they arent the greatest films but have a special liking for DCH and znmd (yeah the much maligned znmd!)
3idiots was a well packaged assembled dish adeptly garnished with key elements over a robust skeleton screenplay
Rock on was easily the weakest of these –though loved the rock group element
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February 25, 2013 at 9:29 PM
@ sanju–“Only oldgold type will twist factors like this to discredit aamir and now my doubts have been confirmed”
Haha what ‘doubts’?-lol a lovely imagination u hav!
So are u feeling now that I have become (or am )Oldgold!!
Earlier, u were suspecting I’m the same as anya ?
Wow –btw what’s that Hindi saying –
” do(teen) badan ek jaan” ha?
Ps: having said, barring all the jokes–Ive realised that my ‘entering’ and ‘becoming’ all these ‘females bodies’ is an interesting thought.
Just imagine the ‘potential’–what all I can do/explore… Hmm 🙂
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February 25, 2013 at 11:55 PM
This KPC kite is cutting Special26, ABCD,Aila Ghaziabad etc. Nothing special. The trend is we have a wonder every second week.
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February 26, 2013 at 12:39 AM
Ka Poi Che held up strongly on Monday as it collected around 3 crore nett which is 20% less than Friday. The circuits which did not open well recorded similar or ever better collections on Monday than Friday while the multiplex dominated metros were lower than Friday by 25-30%.
The four day business is around 19 crore nett and the week should finish around 26 crore nett which would be a decent total for the film and if the weekdays show good trending, it is likely to put up a good second week figure.
The overall business of the film will be best in circuits which have high multiplex contribution like Mumbai, Mysore and West Bengal. The other multiplex dominated circuits like Delhi/UP and East Punjab will be lower as the film opened poorly in these circuits.
BOI
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February 26, 2013 at 12:53 AM
Same story as ABCD.
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February 26, 2013 at 4:20 AM
OTT. Sanjay Leela Bhansali entered into the tv world with Saraswatichandra, a syrupy tale. It is telecast to give competition to the very popular SSLK on Zee. This SSLK’s driving force is an actress called Roopal Tyagi who shot for Fauji 2 for Red chillies which was folded up for various reasons. This girl is such a good actress and dancer and maybe the next entry into Bollywood.
Tv soaps are flourishing like never before and bollywood personalities are eyeing this lucrative market. Can they succeed where one wrong step will affect trps? With remote in hand, the viewer is the king.
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February 26, 2013 at 6:17 AM
Ka Poi Che Holds Strong On Monday
Monday 26th February 2013 10.30 IST
Boxofficeindia.Com Trade Network
Ka Poi Che held up strongly on Monday as it collected around 3 crore nett which is 20% less than Friday. The circuits which did not open well recorded similar or ever better collections on Monday than Friday while the multiplex dominated metros were lower than Friday by 25-30%.
The four day business is around 19 crore nett and the week should finish around 26 crore nett which would be a decent total for the film and if the weekdays show good trending, it is likely to put up a good second week figure.
The overall business of the film will be best in circuits which have high multiplex contribution like Mumbai, Mysore and West Bengal. The other multiplex dominated circuits like Delhi/UP and East Punjab will be lower as the film opened poorly in these circuits.
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February 26, 2013 at 6:19 AM
Zilla Ghaziabad Monday Business
Monday 26th February 2013 10.00 IST
Boxofficeindia.Com Trade Network
Zilla Ghaziabad grossed around 1.75 crore nett on Monday and the drop was 50% on Monday than Friday as single screens in some areas showed good collections.
But despite the film being fairly steady on Monday the 1.75 crore nett figure is a low figure for Monday. The four day business of the film is around 11.75 crore nett and the week should finish at around 15.50 crore nett which is not impressive.
The single screens in UP are best performing due to film having been set in the locality. The collections on Monday at UP single screens were similar to Friday.
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February 26, 2013 at 6:19 AM
taran adarsh @taran_adarsh
#ZilaGhaziabad maintained very well in single screens on Monday. Biz in U.P. in particular is strong.
taran adarsh @taran_adarsh
#KaiPoChe passes the ‘Monday exam’. Collects Rs 3.25 cr [Fri was 4.50 cr]… Reduced ticket rates on weekdays, but footfalls same as Fri.
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February 26, 2013 at 12:30 PM
so thats it! 26 cr 1st week after all the ho-ha from media…….40 cr lifetime?
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February 26, 2013 at 1:11 PM
How Much Should a film with no stars, complete newcomers make? according to you idea?
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February 26, 2013 at 10:09 PM
rooney – that is not the point here – the way media went OTT over this made it look like a 100 cr would be done on the first weekend itself 🙂 talking abt. newcomers – even KJo’s SOTY did more than 50 cr i guess – but i am not comparing two films here mind it. Just that something was not ok with all that praise – at-least the paying public hasn’t showed that kind of enthu. unless it picks up now on……..
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February 26, 2013 at 10:17 PM
i have strengthened my belief that stars like aamir can make such films reach to wider audience – not to take away anything from the newcomers. Newcomers any way are having a gala time in BW at present – KPC/SOTY are two examples. Ranveer/Rajiv K/Randip hooda are also having some good solo films on hands…….regulars like AK/SRK/SALLU/AD/Sunny/Akki/Sanju/HR are also having good films on hands……abhay/irfaan/nawaz/farhaan/ they are all doing many films – so lets say bw is having many options now as far as male leads are concerned – any one left out? yeah – Emraan Hashmi – he is again having some plum films on hands then Abhi has suddenly found B.O. goddess smiling at him and he is having some fantastic films on hand…….who else? I think BW had never had so many options in the past…….Imraan Khan and Ranbir K shd have been mentioned at the top here 🙂 Saif baba doesn’t show any signs of slowing down………Oh my God! 25 solo heroes on the circuit……….simultaneously…..
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February 26, 2013 at 10:25 PM
You have forgotten Vidya, the new hero on the block. Who has such a pull as say Emraan.
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February 26, 2013 at 9:51 PM
There are two ways of looking at this. If critics dont give 4 stars and say it is flawless film, then the multiplex audience wont patronise these films. So critics do a charity and they forget they are critics while reviewing these types of films. After watching some will love the film and some will feel cheated. Single screens cant be influenced but the multiplex crowd can be manipulated.
Even if this film has stars, it wont get crowds in Dabangg style. The story is a bit pseudo intellectual beyond singlescreen’s reach.
It is a win win situation for the newcomers and I hope all the 3 actors will get more films including some masala ones. Among the 3, Amit Sadh has typical bollywood hero looks.
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February 26, 2013 at 6:32 AM
Trailer of Sunny Deol and Kangana Ranaut starrer ‘I Love New York’
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February 26, 2013 at 12:27 PM
this is pure shit! but this will go on to become a sleeper hit 🙂 i wonder what kangana is doing here…….
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February 26, 2013 at 12:41 PM
500 days of summer anyone? for all that juxtaposed drawings of NYC??
this is going to be a treat..both the leads with wonderful English accents..sunny paaji is living the perfect american dream..din kabhi yaad nahin..raat kabhi bhula nahin with multiple partners eh??
must say for 55, sunny is looking very good and youngish..
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February 26, 2013 at 6:10 PM
i hope you are being sarcastic. the whole thing looks horrible. and sunny is wearing a dead raccoon on his head.
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February 28, 2013 at 4:35 PM
Didn’t mind it….Sunny has always had a panache for comedy much like his dad though sadly its an area he’s never been able to expand on much….
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February 26, 2013 at 7:32 AM
First image of Sunny Deol from Anil Sharma’s ‘Singh Sahab The Great’
http://twitpic.com/c5svuz
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February 26, 2013 at 8:15 AM
God help us.
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February 26, 2013 at 6:08 PM
exactly!
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February 26, 2013 at 6:30 PM
hahaha just the title made me laugh–“Singh Sahab The Great’
hail…!
ps–actually folks–liked him in ghayal,arjun,
and hey, even the infamous handpump uprooting scene in gadar
ps–oh anya–great timing –we logged in 2gether oops
now sanju will alledge we are the same person–or that i have ‘entered’ u or something like that 🙂
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February 28, 2013 at 4:27 PM
I always have time for Sunny in this mould and avtar. Granted, his absolute prime Boxoffice days are nowhere near what they used to be, however one simply couldn’t argue that Sunny Deol in a Anil Sharma film, in a GADAR-esque mould will deliver HUGE returns at the boxoffice from the North alone….
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February 26, 2013 at 4:13 PM
Sanjay Leela Bhansali turns 50…images from his party..
http://www.mid-day.com/photos/b-town-specials/sanjay-leela-bhansalis-birthday-bash/1_ash_abhishek/
Hindi films that never got made..I moan the Kamal Haasan-AB one, also DEVAA, coz SG was at a good peak during the ’80s, , and the MUKUL ANAND directed DUS..
Naseer has 30 unreleased films!! and one by Mrinal Sen! What a crime..
The KH – AB Sr one, as far as I know, was an unofficial remake of the Broadway play and movie WHOSE LIFE IS IT ANYWAY? (Drefuss, Cassavettes) & AB was supposed to play the Doctor..the Tamil press (including THE HINDU) cried hoarse that AB Sr suffered from ‘inferiority complex’ and developed cold feet when acting with a ‘superior’ actor like Haasan..& hence the film was shelved mid-way… Kuch bhee
http://www.mid-day.com/photos/b-town-specials/bollywood-films-that-never-released/madhubala-raj-do-ustad/
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February 26, 2013 at 11:45 PM
A bit surprised by the negative comments on Anil Sharma-Sunny’s Singh Saheb- The Great. The duo have delivered decent films together and their box offcie record together is far from bad.
Gadar is the kind of blockbuster any actor will be dreaming of achieving. The Hero was the third highest grosser of its year. Apne was a fine film that trended well. None of these films can be termed as poor. In terms of quality of cinema, they are decent to very good efforts and none of them is a downright flop as well.
They aren’t as prolific as Yash Chopra- SRK or Rohit Shetty-Devgan but with a record of an all time blockbuster, an average grosser and a semi hit isn’t all that bad.
Sure their movies aren’t everyone’s cup of tea but I found the first look and the title quite good. It’s in the lines of what we first saw from Wanted, Singham etc.. I won’t be too surprised if it ends up doing well at the BO.
As for I Love New Year, it seems to be inspired from The Irony Of Fate which is a very successful and popular 1976 Soviet romantic comedy television film:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Irony_of_Fate
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February 27, 2013 at 3:27 AM
If i have to take
DTPH, VZ or JTHJ on one side and other side GEPK, HLOAS, Apne, i will take the latter over the former….
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February 28, 2013 at 4:39 PM
Agree……the likes of WANTED, DABANNG, SINGHAM etc are very new age, and Sunny hasn’t attempted this genre in a while……this, I LOVE NY and YPD 2 gives him 3 different films in 3 different genres…
Also, any news of Rajveer Singh Deols aka Rocky’s debut??
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February 28, 2013 at 4:42 PM
http://www.liveindia.com/rocky-deol/index.html
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February 27, 2013 at 2:35 AM
After five days the business of Kai Po Che is very similar to ABCD – Any Body Can Dance. Many circuits have similar figures, the only major difference in the business of both films for first five days is that ABCD – Anybody Can Dance was around 25% stronger in Mumbai while Kai Po Che is 50% stronger in Delhi/UP and East Punjab.
The figures in Rajasthan, CI, West Bengal and Mysore are set to be very similar for both films in week one and so will the all India total with Kai Po Che also grossing around the 26 crore nett mark in week one as North India cancels out the lead that ABCD – Any Body Can Dance has in Mumbai.
Kai Po Che has scored well in Mumbai city, Pune, Kolkatta, Bangalore and parts of Delhi NCR while good business in other areas was also going to be a stiff task due to content and no face value although Gujarat could have given the film a boost as it was set there but business remained below the mark in Gujarat and Saurashtra.
BOI
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February 27, 2013 at 6:20 AM
Hit Che!
By Taran Adarsh, February 27, 2013 – 08:15 IST
The naysayers, or the prophets of doom, have been proven wrong yet again. KAI PO CHE, starring three relative newcomers, has notched a remarkable total in its opening weekend. You may find this hard to believe, but the Fri-to-Sun figures of KAI PO CHE [Rs 18.10 cr] are better than KAHAANI [Rs 13.83 cr], PAAN SINGH TOMAR [Rs 4.25 cr] and VICKY DONOR [Rs 7.40 cr], which were in the same space [unconventional films, all]. Now that’s a tall achievement, isn’t it?
What’s heartening is that UTV believed in the film and gave it a fantabulous release. Additionally, look at UTV’s confidence in KAI PO CHE: The film had its global premiere at Berlinale nine days prior to its release [on Wednesday], the critics who matter watched the film exactly a week in advance [on Friday], while UTV hosted a gala premiere for the crème de la crème of the entertainment industry in Mumbai five days before it hit the screens in India [on Monday]. Besides, the KAI PO CHE team promoted the film extensively on all platforms [television, radio, internet, print] in India and also in the international markets… As a matter of fact, UTV ensured that the film was ‘visible’ and talked about prior to its release everywhere.
Even the release strategy adopted by UTV for KAI PO CHE was most appropriate, targeting plexes and premium single screens in India. In the international arena, most films starring newcomers rarely get a theatrical release in major markets such as U.K. and U.S.A. [JAANE TU… YA JAANE NA and STUDENT OF THE YEAR are exceptions, but those films had Aamir Khan and Karan Johar, respectively backing the projects — names that enjoy tremendous following in Overseas], but KAI PO CHE was released like any biggie there. The conviction or gamble, whatever you call it, has paid off and how!
The audience mandate was evident on Friday itself, when the morning shows concluded. KAI PO CHE is a rare film that’s riding on glowing reviews and positive audience mandate, hence the business was bound to witness ample growth over the weekend. The day-wise growth in business, even at single screens, is proof that the film has worked big time. The rock-steady business on weekdays clearly indicates that the film has long legs. I am supremely confident that KAI PO CHE will continue to radiate in Weekend 2 as well.
The success of KAI PO CHE will spur film-makers and Studios to endorse movies starring newcomers, with content doing the talking. The success of KAI PO CHE will persuade film-makers to think beyond the stereotype. The success of KAI PO CHE will help introduce fresh, deserving talent at a time when almost all top actors have turned producers and there’s genuine scarcity of new talent in the industry.
Do I hear KAI PO CHE producers Ronnie Screwvala and Siddharth Roy Kapur, director Abhishek Kapoor, writers Pubali Chaudhuri, Supratik Sen, Abhishek Kapoor and Chetan Bhagat, associate producer Manish Hariprasad, actors Rajkumar Yadav, Amit Sadh, Sushant Singh Rajput and Amrita Puri, UTV’s core team of Shikha Kapur [marketing], Gaurav Verma [India distribution], Lokesh Dhar and Amrita Pandey [Overseas distribution] and everyone associated with the film scream with elation, ‘kaipo che’?
PS: The success of VICKY DONOR and now KAI PO CHE also shatters the age-old myth that television actors cannot make it big in movies [Ayushmann Khurrana, Sushant and Amit started their careers in television].
* * * * *
The other release, ZILA GHAZIABAD, a multi-starrer, got eclipsed by the KAI PO CHE wave at plexes, although the film is maintaining quite well at single screens in the mass-dominated belt, especially in U.P.
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February 27, 2013 at 8:45 AM
wow, a whole post! so ta is on utv’s payroll now i guess?
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February 27, 2013 at 7:03 AM
but the Fri-to-Sun figures of KAI PO CHE [Rs 18.10 cr] are better than KAHAANI [Rs 13.83 cr], PAAN SINGH TOMAR [Rs 4.25 cr] and VICKY DONOR [Rs 7.40 cr], which were in the same space [unconventional films, all]. Now that’s a tall achievement, isn’t it?
Impressive figures. Instead of calling these films as unconventional, we can call them small budget films. What is so unconventional about these films?
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February 27, 2013 at 7:19 AM
http://www.addatoday.com/2013/02/imran-khan-ranbir-me-not-running.html#more
For those who are interested in Imran Khan Pal.
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February 27, 2013 at 8:46 AM
very good interview.
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February 27, 2013 at 10:35 AM
You might be already aware of this but if in case you are not- Spike Lee is currently making the Oldboy remake with Josh Brolin playing the lead guy and Sharlto Copley as the baddie.
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February 27, 2013 at 8:11 PM
yes, and i am dreading it.
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February 27, 2013 at 10:19 PM
Why? If Chan Wook himself can do a remake of Stoker I do not see any issue with this if done properly. Now I know that Spike has never handled this genre but otherwise he is a talented guy. I really liked Inside Man (Lee was doing a heist film for the first time here) and 25th Hour was one of the decade’s best films. Jungle Fever and Malcolm X need no introduction.
The major problem as I see it is that the studio might want a more ‘sanitized’ version of the remake by cutting down the violence and the heavy sexually-charged scenes which were integral to the original film
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February 28, 2013 at 6:00 AM
Bcos for some ‘sanitised’ version isn’t enough 🙂
Will catch some movies in a flight now
Incidentally got ‘thirst'(Korean)
Ps: Anya –is it worth watching ?u must have seen it lol
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February 27, 2013 at 9:23 AM
Antya:
satyam, when trying to get on the website in google chrome, a warning pops up. may be it needs to be fixed?
Satyam:
yes someone else told me about this as well.. I don’t use Chrome but I haven’t had this issue on other browsers. The thing is that there are so many links being posted here that something possibly raises a flag somewhere. In any case the site is housed at wordpress. They take care of a lot of this stuff. Beyond the basic spam related issues and so on don’t think I can do much more.
An Jo:
Yes, I did tell Satyam about this a week back when I started noticing it….it never used to happen before..i always used chrome (the incognito option when in office!!!)
Satyam:
my Mcafee check gives it a green signal.
http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_22556675/google-chrome-browser-blocks-websites-malware-warnings-including
might be related to this..
check this out too:
http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_22556675/google-chrome-browser-blocks-websites-malware-warnings-including
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February 27, 2013 at 11:48 AM
It works fine at my end..It shows “sending request” at bottom banner for some time.
I have tried safari (Mac and iPhone)
Antya – Could you please post the warning verbatim?
ps – I see the issue now.
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February 27, 2013 at 12:54 PM
Please remove ” Phir-Wohi-Raat” poster from side bar. It is below Rajput.
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February 27, 2013 at 1:12 PM
thanks for figuring this out. Removed it.
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February 27, 2013 at 6:10 PM
welldone folks with all this malware stuff..
“Please remove ” Phir-Wohi-Raat””–that sounds a dodgy film lol
FOlks–suggest one stops going to dodgy porn/ish sites
Also check what your partner(s) (if any) are upto…
Those who have ‘pet dogs’ should check the surfing history of their ‘dogs’
🙂
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February 27, 2013 at 6:38 PM
no it’s actually a worthwhile film. A somewhat cheesy suspense-thriller (with horror elements) starring Rajesh Khanna.
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February 27, 2013 at 8:40 PM
actually, not happening on my end any more
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February 27, 2013 at 8:44 PM
Munna’s the man!
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February 28, 2013 at 6:07 AM
“actually, not happening on my end any more”
But anya -can see ya–thru that malware bug 🙂
“munna the man!”
Typo -munnas the WOman
Oops that’s a bad bad pj lol
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February 27, 2013 at 1:11 PM
LMAO!!!!! I was expecting this from outlook or Caravan…….Badee sulag rahee hai commies kee………….
http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/02/27/did-chetan-bhagat-scrub-whitewash-the-godhra-riots-in-kai-po-che/
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February 27, 2013 at 1:42 PM
Haven’t seen the film yet but I am entirely sympathetic to this piece. Of course when it’s a question of Narendra Modi I don’t find certain questions debatable to begin with. Those who insist on evidence or ‘both sides of the story’ in this context are guilty of moral obtuseness or moral bankruptcy or both. Violence has to be clearly condemned in every situation without any ifs or buts. This doesn’t mean that contexts aren’t important for analytic reasons. But this doesn’t make the violence, specially certain kinds ok. So for instance there’s a while history of colonization in the Mideast, an entire history supporting Islamist elements by the same powers to further certain interests, so on and so forth. All of this analysis is important to figure out what’s really going on. But this doesn’t lessen the obscene violence of the 9/11 attacks or what have you. Much as no Muslim grievance with respect to the Indian govt gives anyone the right to blow up bombs in crowded cities. There can be no negotiation on condemning certain kinds of violence. This doesn’t at all preclude recognizing what else is going on within the same economy of violence. Getting back to Modi Godhra is actually a red herring. Leaving aside the murkiness surrounding this episode let’s assume that what literally happened was that Muslims set fire to the train. This ‘justifies’ what later happened only if one chooses to believe that there was some spontaneous riot rather than the actual state-assisted pogroms that took place. Again a lot of the state’s bureaucratic and administrative machinery being involved doesn’t make every Gujarati Hindu in the state responsible. I wouldn’t even draw a straight line between supporters of Modi and responsibility for this event for the simple reason that people believe a lot of things in an irresponsible way. Which doesn’t make the beliefs harmless but one also cannot draw a straight line between the two. This is in fact the sort of logic that precedes every such act of butchery. Where an entire community is held to be collectively responsible for the a subset of the same. But my larger point here is that there shouldn’t be evasion on this score. Either an act of violence is wrong or it isn’t. When one introduces all kinds of justification one is offering a similar excuse to every monstrous kind of violence in history. So the riots/pogroms happen because of Godhra (even accepting this logic), 9/11 happens because of something else, state violence comes about because of another event, so on and so forth. What great perpetrator of violence in history says he or she is doing so just for the fun of it? They always have ideological excuses at hand!
In an unrelated but analogous vein check out Zizek’s response to Bigelow here:
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February 27, 2013 at 1:46 PM
Put differently when Hitler starts directing people to the camps you don’t start debating whether it is justifiable or not to treat a certain community this way. You assert in the most absolute terms that it is unacceptable.
On the other hand when FDR interns the Japanese you don’t say ‘hey this is bad but it’s still nothing like Nazi Germany’. You reject this as equally unacceptable in the same absolute sense.
When it is this kind of violence there’s no question of degree. It’s not ok to kill people in terrorist attacks if only 10 die. The repellent nature of the act isn’t tied to number. Whether 10 die or a 1000 both are equally obscene acts.
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February 27, 2013 at 4:45 PM
Not disputing a word above by you Satyam, but the article in question is Laughable to say the least. The author’s major Pareshaani is the fact that Chetan Bhagat had praised modi earlier, she just can not digest that fact, so she launching personal attacks on him , bringing in Rushdie, Murthy, and anything and everything… and a bunch of lies !!!
Itnee Nafrat bharee hai inn commies logo mein jitnee Republicans ko Obama sey nahee hai !! LOL!!!
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February 27, 2013 at 4:47 PM
also the word “Sudden” before Train fire says it all !!!
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February 27, 2013 at 5:19 PM
LOL,like Bhagat dont want to take sides and dont want to start another debate about Godhra riots. But am reminded of a dialogue from Sholay where Thakur’s man says- Khota sikka dono bajoo se khota hota hai and Thakur says- Shayad insaan aur sikke mein yehi ek fark hai! There is a lot more to Modi than his role in Godhra riots and like Republicans used to say in defense of Bush that there has been no major domestic terrorist attack after 9/11, there has been no major recurrence of Hindu-Muslim riots in Gujarat after Godhra while before it was a monthly affair. Something to think about. And, it certainly is not because Muslims are suppressed but it became clear that Modi was not going to tolerate their unprovoked precipitating acts lightly and that there was a price to pay.Doesnt quite justify any loss of innocent lives but does make one wonder. And, this comi g from a self confessed liberal! Those opining on Godhra riots often have not lived thru the reality of Hindu- Muslim riots in Gujarat.
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February 27, 2013 at 5:42 PM
Yes but don’t you think there is something disturbing about this logic? Isn’t this exactly the kind that was behind Dawood Ibrahim’s terrorist attacks following the Shiv Sena abetted ‘riots’ in Bombay? Since then nothing has happened in Bombay. And there are people who quote these events approvingly much as the Shiv Sena also had the whole ‘Muslims had to be taught a lesson’ logic.
Secondly there’s no way to prevent the loss of innocent life as long as someone is in the business of teaching some community a lesson.
But also as a pragmatic matter those who engage in such acts aren’t exactly taught a lesson because the larger communities they belong to are terrorized by the state. The Muslim terrorists gallivanting around the globe aren’t particularly bothered that in many Western countries their community is hounded in instances.
Of course all of this is separate from the Godhra debate where to this day things remain murky. But we’ve been through this debate before. Here I was just using this an example in a larger debate.
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February 28, 2013 at 10:05 AM
Rajen very well said as usual….
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February 28, 2013 at 10:18 AM
Yes..very well said Rajen Sir! Agree with you wholeheartedly (for a change).
There was a movie..in recent times…on how this top politician takes money from Pakistan and get the riots going! It was quite a movie. I forgot the name and title of the movie right this minute. Most politicians are corrupt in India…well..all of them. Except for Modi!! He is the only one who never cared for minority votes…even Bajpai/Advani…all those gave hajj subsidies when time came. I personally don’t think there were state sponsored “pograms” as commies tend to indicate. I don’t think Modi had any other hand other than a slight delay (3 days)…but why crucify him. Sonia and her people didn’t do anything for week when that girl was raped, in recent times. No one gets persecuted in India for “delay”. Even in movies, the police coming in long after crime is done, is so expected and normal. So somehow Modi is supposed to be very-very efficient and stop riots right away? It doesn’t work like that in India unfortunately.
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February 28, 2013 at 11:33 AM
the problem with Modi is not about efficiency. These are the terms of the debate invented by those who refuse to see the horror of his crimes. Essentially there are two versions here:
1)The murkiness surrounding the Godhra events and pogroms that were engineered with the active involvement of Modi’s state machinery.
2)That Godhra caused the riots that followed. Muslims originated the attacks, Hindus took revenge quite naturally.
The problem is that there is no objective history or analysis of Godhra whether nationally or from outside India that confirms the second ‘version’ here. Which the adherents of Modi deal with by calling a vast leftist conspiracy. Presumably one that’s operative globally too since the only thing people are interested in is bringing down Modi.
But even if one accepts the first half of the second version there were no ‘riots’. There was nothing ‘natural’ about what followed. It was engineered. All of this is incidentally very well-played out in Dev. Once again the Modi adherents have to deny this. They have to pretend that there’s something very abstract and uncontrolled that happened in every sense except of course with the original event where the same folks are sure as to what precisely happened!
However, even if one accepts the second version at face value there is something very terrifying about this logic in the ways I’ve outlined above with the Dawood Ibrahim example. But in addition to this it’s a bit like saying that once 9/11 happens it would be perfectly ‘natural’ and ‘legitimate’ if all Muslims who had nothing to do with the attacks were nonetheless ruthlessly attacked and if the same collateral damage argument was used there. Here I will once again refer to my longer point above. One is ethically repulsive if one draws this equivalence irrespective of what version of events one believes.
But then within the liberal supporters of Modi there is another logic whereby one doesn’t support the violence but one also keeps it consigned to a ‘grey area’ in one’s mind where one ‘never really knows’ what happened either way and one also asserts that Modi’s reputation cannot be reduced to this event. The problem that this entire logic right down to the last letter sounds suspiciously like the kind used to defend Hitler and many other fascists in history (in fact many totalitarian figures of both stripes). So with Hitler he created an economic boom in Germany, things were great, he restored national pride by showing Britain and France that they couldn’t dictate terms anymore, so on and so forth. The Modi variant of this is — he he’s not just about the riots, consider how great Ahmmedavad/Amdavad has been under him! Meanwhile people become expert commentators on the plight of Muslims in the state. There have been extensive human rights reports on what happened during the pogroms but also the fear with which many minorities have lived in the state since. All of this can once again be neatly dismissed as global leftist paranoia which apparently has no grander target than Narendra Modi!
But the very same folks in the US context are suddenly very suspicious of the current Republican party if not haters of it and are great supporters of Obama. Suddenly when the Republicans bring up similar ‘commie’ (as Rocky would have it) charges against Obama they are all crazies and kooks! I am the greatest critic of the present day Republican party but I find it more than laughable if Narendra Modi and the BJP are considered more benign political forces than the Republican party! It beggars belief!
There is lots of evidence and unbiased reporting and analysis on the events of Godhra and what transpired after this. One can choose not to believe it in the service of a political ideology and/or other more personal considerations. But the horrible lesson that one learns from events like Nazism is precisely that ordinary people doing very ordinary things were nonetheless participants, consciously or otherwise, in one of the worst political systems in history. For all this I had the harshest reaction to the movie Firaaq because for me it precisely isn’t about the people of Gujarat or any such essentialist argument. I do not believe Muslims are prone to anything, nor Hindus in the same way, nor Gujaratis and so on. There is always political ideology that intervenes and makes people at times monstrous political actors. To submit Modi to the harshest criticism is not to submit the people of Gujarat to the same, not even for that matter many other BJP leaders to the same (with whom I might disagree violently but I do recognize differences in degree).
Getting back to the familiar right/left debate that I and Rocky often banter about (because we are friends) the problem is that once again this is all too familiar a paradigm. The Fascist right always presents the left as dangerous communists against whom certain kinds of violence or what have you is justified. Now of course there are monstrous Communist histories in the twentieth century and beyond. But this is the bogeyman the Right successfully employs in all circumstances. So In Nazi Germany you had the Jews who were a minority but apparently running things and controlling all the levers of power and so on. A Nazi politics was then needed to cleanse the country. But you also had a virulent anti-Communist politics at the same level. In the Hindutva version of the same Muslims do the same and the rest follows. Here the specter of old Muslim conquests (which were of course very brutal at many points though presumably one also takes into account the global standards of say the 16th century or whatever it is, in these matters, and doesn’t judge them by 20th century ones, not that this more recent century offers many more enlightened examples) comes in handy though it is in principle not very different from the old European stereotypes of the ‘nefarious’, ‘blood-sucking’, ‘Christ-killing’ (this beats the Somnath desecration doesn’t it?!) Jews who were secretly controlling and in the process deliberately weakening all the nice Christian nations!
Once again it’s not about political ideology which is an altogether different debate but the extent to which one is willing to be blind to the truth to support the same or willing to explain away the most basic human considerations as part of some abstract calculus. I’m a great Obama supporter but that doesn’t mean I find the Drone policy ok. I understand the relevant history here, how and why this logic has come about, so on and so forth.. but I still don’t find the final result ok. There are certain things in life that have to be asserted unconditionally. To bring up Zizek’s example once more if a woman is being raped we should stop the rape first before anything else. We shouldn’t start a debate about what led to the rape and who’s more responsible for it and whatever! When we engage in these abstract kinds of logic where even though we might consciously assert that we don’t support the loss of innocent human life we are quite willing to consign the same to some measure of collateral damage (hey ‘they’ did it to us first) we end up contradicting ourselves. This gets me back to that ‘burning building’ sequence in Dev. Nothing justifies this. Not the terrorist attack that preceded it. Nothing at all. The moment we place these kinds of atrocities in some larger, economic calculus of violence we immediately justify the original event too. Because those actors also work with the same logic except that they have a different narrative. They too think they’re justified.
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February 28, 2013 at 11:49 AM
On that note this book offers a lucid summary of all the relevant issues:
Nussbaum is a well-known thinker who for many years has focused on religious intolerance around the globe and has written different books detailing these excesses in different societies. Check out some of the blurbs here.
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February 28, 2013 at 11:55 AM
I dont think the blog will be served well by rehashing of the arguments by the two sides about the Godhra and the post- Godhra incidents. However, the idea that the Godhra burning of Karsewaks didnt happen or wasnt an unprovoked Muslim act ( pre-planned or not) is absurd.
As to the retaliation and Modi government’s role in it, my argument is that it is not black and white.
History has shown us that nothing has worked in Gujarat and in India as prevention of Hindu-Muslim riots go. There should again be NO argument whatsoever as to which side should bear the lions share of the blame. Any notion that Muslims in India are suppressed or oppressed is ABSOLUTELY preposterous. They enjoy the same rights if not more and a significant section abuses those. Aided and abetted by Congress and its allies, they are pandered to in a ridiculous manner. They have no grounds to play victim. Even if one argues thst the vast majority ( and it is not true) of Muslims in India dont behave in an irresponsible or communal manner, they certainly are willing to merrily go along without questioning or opposing the practices of the unruly and communal elements. And, are often sympathetic. They are not so INNOCENT and bear some responsibility for the state of affairs too. The real question is when one talks about the ‘innocent’ Muslims, one wonders how innocent they really are and how many of them. My personal experience is not much and not too many. I dont want to denounce an entire community but truth is truth
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February 28, 2013 at 12:15 PM
check out this link
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February 28, 2013 at 12:14 PM
Satyam, I Agree with Rajen, let’s leave this discussion….
I have to say this though that you are one of the very few people whose personal intergrity in regards to this whole debate I do NOT doubt…..I have in the past compared you to Shourie which to me is the biggest compliment I can give anyone.
one day we shall have a drink and thrash this issue out….
My main objective of putting up this article was to show that the author forgot all about the merits of the movie and started trashing Bhagat and Gujrat and Modi…….this is what these Jholawallaha do !!!
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February 28, 2013 at 12:23 PM
thanks for the comment Rocky and as I’ve said before where you are concerned it’s a debate between friends. Rajen is on the left side of the equation anyway with a Gujarat exception thrown in!
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February 28, 2013 at 12:18 PM
agree with RajenSir and OmSaab..opps Rockysaab. We shouldn’t discuss Modi 😉
He is too controversial
Lolz
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February 28, 2013 at 12:22 PM
Aside – yeh Rajen sahab bol rahen hain ya Dev key Om Puri bol rahe hain….LOL!!!
Rajen – you will be getting timeout for 4 days from SS for Satyavachan !!
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February 28, 2013 at 12:25 PM
“Aside – yeh Rajen sahab bol rahen hain ya Dev key Om Puri bol rahe hain….LOL!!!”
Rajen on the other side of Bachchan! This truly is the Kalyug!
Jokes aside I think Rajen is to your left generally except on the Modi matter where he is to your right!
Ultimately though you are an AAA kind of person. You’re secretly far more on Desai’s Nehruvian side (much as you’ll hate this characterization!) at least in a cultural sense than you think. And herein lies the problem. The Muslim ‘invader’ can be argued against at a political level but the cultural strands just cannot be separated. Much as we are all minimally children of British colonialism.
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February 28, 2013 at 12:24 PM
Rocky – Aur jo log pite nahi hain? 😉
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February 28, 2013 at 12:26 PM
Munna- Jo peetey nahee hain, woh jeetey nahee hain !!!! LOL
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February 28, 2013 at 12:27 PM
“check out this link..”
Aap logo nay yeh link dekha?!?!!!!! Satyam needs to go to Godhra some day…maybe take a train and see what happens….
P.S: I have!
PS1: This is the problem I have with “satyam”. He never is dynamic in his thoughts. I mean…one should be little flexible naa?! I changed my thoughts on Abhishek interacting with him. Now he too should try to be a little flexible 🙂
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February 28, 2013 at 12:34 PM
never took a train to Afghanistan or Yemen either. I just assume the Drones cause a certain kind of damage. I am also shamelessly inflexible when it comes to the US atomic bombing of Japan. Never took a train ride to Hiroshima though. The Turks massacred a million Armenians a century ago. To this day the state refuses to accept this. In fact it is a crime to assert this publicly in that country. Once again I never took a train ride there. The Turkish govt (at least for the longest time) assures me it’s all propaganda. I tend to choose my train rides carefully…
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February 28, 2013 at 12:32 PM
Satyam,
Checked the link. All I can say is that as a work of fiction it is interesting but certainly not meant for serious consumption!
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February 28, 2013 at 12:36 PM
Darn, my crucial bit of evidence thrown out by the judge! Oh well more serious problems await. Like the lionizing of RNBDJ by some..
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February 28, 2013 at 12:46 PM
Re: Like the lionizing of RNBDJ by some..
Now, THAT is a serious crime and no punishment for it can be deemed too harsh or extreme!
Not meaning to trivialise Godhra riots or anything like that!
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February 28, 2013 at 1:07 PM
“Now, THAT is a serious crime and no punishment for it can be deemed too harsh or extreme!”
we are finally in agreement!
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February 28, 2013 at 12:55 PM
As I see it, Hindu majority in India has too two options – Silently suffer the habitual shenanigans of the Muslims or retaliate and be accused of genocide !
There are too many well meaning but deluded and misguided ‘liberals” to pick up the cudgels on behalf of the ‘innocent’ and ‘repressed’ Muslims !
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February 28, 2013 at 2:14 PM
“All I can say is that as a work of fiction it is interesting but certainly not meant for serious consumption!”
True.
At some point they will say that Godhra never happened. That later riots were just unprovoked attacks!
In Godhar train compartments all were hindus. The later/follow-up hindu-muslim riots had more hindus dying than the minority people (as it happens in any riots)
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February 28, 2013 at 2:48 PM
I thought the Muslim:Hindu ratio in the post-Godhra violence was 3:1 but hey this could be another Western conspiracy..! Actually those are the govt figures, many independent bodies think the imbalance was even greater than that. Anyway don’t wish to rake this up all over again. The larger debate matters more to me.
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February 28, 2013 at 2:22 PM
“never took a train to Afghanistan or Yemen either. …”
Satyam..you always stand the argument on its head to make it appear “OK”! Those comparitions are invalid and we can also go back and forth all day long on this!
Firstly I am referring to the article that you posted (google doc one). ONLY if you took the train to Godhara, for instance, you will see lot of fallacies in that argument.
* Do you know what meaning of Godhara is? Do you know who lives there?
* Do you know WHAT time the train arrives there? etc etc etc
So your arguemnts on “train” to yemen, japan,istambul..yada..yada doesn’t matter. THAT was NOT my point!!!!!
If you know FACTS, then you can check the “evidence” that the stupid author has authored! There are LOTS of anti-Semitic people who present “facts” of how holocaust never happened…would you then implicitly trust that “evidence”. So garbage-in, garbage-out (as they say in my field).
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February 28, 2013 at 2:45 PM
There is some irony isn’t there in using the same sources for objective evidence on the Holocaust that one later denies when the same objective evidence is presented for what might or might not have happened at Godhra?!
Why are my analogies invalid though? I find the Drone policy problematic or brutal or whatever but I have never actually visited Afghanistan and never actually seen what happens in any area where there’s a Drone strike. There are those who say it’s completely clean and those who say that there is a lot of collateral damage. It is precisely the same argument.
By the way in debates on 9/11 I tend not to quiz people on the linguistic origins of Manhattan or the cultural histories of NYC or what times the trains pull in at Grand Central or Penn Station. I admit my logical lapses here.
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February 28, 2013 at 7:17 PM
Our media celebs hate it if Muslims are caught in hate-speeches or acts of terror. They probably wish it were Hindus instead. They can’t even stand the acquittal of Hindus in many legal cases. If a Hindu is acquitted it’s like a criminal was allowed to go scot-free. If Muslims are arrested then their community is being victimised. This is the essence of “Sickularism”. Then again, when some were convicted in the Godhra train burning and terror case NDTV promptly announced that “63 were acquitted”. Yes indeed, those were “innocent” Muslims”. But when the courts acquitted 29 in the Naroda Patiya case of Gujarat 2002 they were “let off”. These 29 Hindus were, of course, guilty as hell and the courts had let them off and allowed them to walk free. Such injustice, eh? That’s the kind of hatred that NDTV breeds for justice and contempt for Hindus even when courts pronounced verdict. Just in case you forgot, these same channels called the Ayodhya verdict of the Allahabad High Court a “Panchayati verdict”.
http://www.mediacrooks.com/2013/03/intolerable-acquittals.html
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February 27, 2013 at 5:17 PM
LOL on the last bit! Though I note your shift. In one context you privilege the left side of the debate (for the Republicans it is precisely Obama who’s the commie!), in the other the right one!
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February 27, 2013 at 5:53 PM
2b concise–in these contexts—the frequency, scale and intensity of ‘offences’ also matter (infact should matter)…
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February 27, 2013 at 11:32 PM
2b concise–in these contexts—the frequency, scale and intensity of ‘offences’ also matter (infact should matter)…
Very well said.
Here Modi factor is always an enigma. Rajen says, that communal clashes have come to end in gujarat after the pogrom. It is like spanking a rebellious boy and making him obedient for the time being. But what about the resentment that is being harboured? Which is like a ticking timebomb ready to explode? Will that tag moth ka saudagar will ever leave? Bofors is till associated with the gandhi family even after such a long time and so is Emergency and Sikh riots.
Teaching a lesson is a very dangerous thing unless you eliminate the enemy completely. A wounded tiger will wait for
another chance. What about Haren Pandya? Was he also taught a lesson?
If gujarat has become such a safe place, why Modi has such an unprecedented security around himself? If he is that popular among everyone, who will harm him knowing the repercussions?
There are so many questions.
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February 28, 2013 at 6:03 AM
Sanju- I’m trying to avoid heavy duty stuff
No need for more ‘stress’ lol
Ps: c’mon folks–
We don’t ask for Megan foxes on flight
But atleast there shouldn’t be gramps about to go into retirement !!!
Ps: will hav to do something …lol
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February 28, 2013 at 10:06 AM
Satyam- I knew you would notice and comment on that….
as Norman Goldman calls Obama- he is a moderate Republican ! LOL!
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February 27, 2013 at 2:22 PM
This is one of THE MAJOR problems I had with this movie..the problem of pretense..it makes the movie so superficial/ridiculous while trying to be ‘oh so for the youth’ and so ‘confident’ of its craft..The craft might be good..but the soul is HUGELY corrupted..
The writer has WRITTEN very well what I felt as soon as I saw the movie..
Sometimes I feel such soul-corrupted movies do more damage to the perennially indifferent bubble-gum chewing crowd that a 100 Owaisis or Togadia put together…
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February 28, 2013 at 8:03 AM
OmSaab…the promos of RGV’s new filim are really good…seems like he is back in form…pura sixer mara hai. RGV is big bhagat of K. Bigelow. After a long time RGV was really ‘scared’ and has been careful in making this flick.
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February 28, 2013 at 10:07 AM
You may be right Di, but will wait for the DVD to come out…
Aside- Call me Rocky, OmSaab bada Shraeef aur Ajeeb sa lagta hai !! LOL!!
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February 28, 2013 at 10:24 AM
Rocky saab..agar aap pirated DVD mai sab movies dekha karogey toh filmmakers kaisey survive hongey, haaii?
PS: did you see some of RGV’s tweets on K.B? They are most interesting 😉
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February 28, 2013 at 10:36 AM
who is KB? also went to his timeline did not see anything ?
I always wait for original DVD and watch it on big TV…never seen a movie on computer screen ….
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February 28, 2013 at 11:17 AM
Kathryn Bigelow. KB
Attach your cell phone or laptop to TV. There are some fun sites which have free movies, advert free, high quality dvd. I do that from time to time for older movies. Oscar apps for behind the scene from my cell to tv…but didn’t watch it for too long.
I watched Ishkzadey from my laptop to tv. 🙂
Some of my friends watch cricket on their big screen (laptop to tv) all the time….
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February 28, 2013 at 12:17 PM
Di jee, abhee January mein hee pehlee baar smart phone liya hai….bahut bewakoof banata hai, dabao 5, dabta 4 hai, , my friends say it takes time to get used to the touch screen…
abhee fihaal toh badee uljhan ho rahee hai… LOL
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February 28, 2013 at 4:02 PM
Me too…though “techy” I am totally “untechy” in mamlo mai. Also it is total RIP OFF….my whole career was nearly with cell ph. companies up until recently 😦
It is all part of “demonstration” effect and sajish from the capitalist
PS: one of the big admiration I have for bigb: moving with times and technology!
PS1: my kiddos have their own laptops even before elementary school and they lock the laptop keyboard on me (I just figured out how to unlock it this morning!) lolz
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February 28, 2013 at 6:24 PM
LOL, same here, my kids know more about the phones than me at this point, my daughter has already downloaded all kinds of stuff on her phone , wheras my phone does not have a single app. LOL!!
PS-bought three Samsung Galaxy3 at the same time !!
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February 28, 2013 at 6:50 PM
download couch potato to 5K app (there are several)..keeps you fit 🙂
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February 27, 2013 at 1:33 PM
Interesting article.
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February 27, 2013 at 2:18 PM
this show started airing on HBO yesterday, the DVD though is already available in Britian, will probably end up getting the latter as I’m a great fan of the book…
NY Times:
February 25, 2013
Television Review
Not the Same Old Cup of British Tea
By ALESSANDRA STANLEY
Saying that a television series depicts the English aristocracy on the brink of World War I and beyond is almost a disservice — the description sounds like yet another big Masterpiece Theater bore, or worse, an amusing one like “Downton Abbey.” “Parade’s End,” a co-production of the BBC and HBO that begins on Tuesday on HBO, looks like a lush elegy to the Edwardian age, but it’s not nearly as swoony and nostalgic as most others of the genre. Tom Stoppard adapted Ford Madox Ford’s tetralogy into a five-part series, streamlining and speeding up the story without dumbing it down.
Like Ford’s modernist opus, and its brainy, punctilious hero, Christopher Tietjens (Benedict Cumberbatch), the series is not easy to follow or instantly love, but it is impossible to dismiss. That’s partly thanks to artful storytelling and gifted acting, especially by Rebecca Hall, who is a bewitching hoot in the role of Christopher’s bored, unfaithful wife, Sylvia.
It’s a series that inevitably draws comparisons with “Downton Abbey,” since they share the same upper-class trappings and totems. Tietjens, a brilliant statistician, is an old-fashioned English gentleman, good with horses, furniture and propriety. He is chivalrously loyal to Sylvia, a spoiled beauty who scorns her husband’s stuffy rectitude, even as she is piqued by it. She dismisses him as a “great lump,” yet can’t stop poking him.
“Parade’s End” tells the story of a bad marriage, set in a much broader context of a rotting civilization.
And that’s the real difference between it and “Downton Abbey.” That show is a gauzy anachronism in period costumes; the first novel of “Parade’s End” was published in 1924, and the series is enmeshed in the great cataclysm of the time, underscoring the cruelty of the age as much as its charm.
It’s more cleareyed about a lot of things, including the British class system. Even kindhearted masters don’t confide in their servants; they barely talk to them. Sylvia flippantly refers to her indispensable maid as “Hallo Central” — in the novel she explains that it’s because the maid has a tinny voice, like a telephone operator’s.
And unlike “Downton Abbey,” which used the trench warfare in France mostly as a plot device to keep young lovers apart, “Parade’s End” is, above all else, a treatise on the Great War, the massacre of an entire generation of young men at the front, and also the poisoning of an entire class looking on from the safety of club chairs and literary salons.
Nobody in London society believes that war in Europe is imminent except Tietjens, who has been warning his friends and colleagues about German militarism for years. Then again, he is outmoded even in those blinkered social circles, a man who, unlike the narrator of the other Ford Madox Ford classic, “The Good Soldier,” isn’t deluded at all; Tietjens may well be the last lucid man in England.
Except when it comes to his love life. In the opening episode Tietjens is tricked into marrying Sylvia, who is pregnant by a married man and needs a husband to avoid social ruin. Sylvia is a handful: a Roman Catholic who is impious, unfaithful, selfish, callous, malicious and, unexpectedly, good-humored — she can laugh even at her own absurdities. She is effortlessly alluring. Even as he is dragging himself to the altar, Tietjens can’t help flashing back to his seduction and admitting that he finds Sylvia “glorious.”
Nor is Sylvia entirely wrong about her husband’s priggishness. “I will not see you incommoded,” he tells an author he has decided to help. “You’ve written the only novel since the 18th century I’ve not had to correct in the margins.”
Tietjens’s moral standards are tested when he meets a lovely, high-minded young suffragist, Valentine (Adelaide Clemens), who returns his affections. He sticks to his principles, but the two are smeared by gossip and calumny anyway.
Tietjens doesn’t punish Sylvia or fight his enemies, partly because that would be bad form, but also because he has a martyr’s streak with fantasies of being an Anglican saint. His passivity — and devotion to lost causes like honor and duty — might seem quaintly pointless, except that it mirrors the soldier’s fate in combat.
When war is declared, Tietjens resigns from his cushy government job and signs up for the trenches. It’s not so different from civilian life.
As Tietjens demonstrates, a virtuous person in society is almost as helpless and ill used as the soldier who is forced to risk his life following senseless orders, a sitting duck under enemy fire and the shortsightedness and self-advancement of politicians, bureaucrats and generals. Nobility lies in sacrifice as much as in bold action.
It’s all very tragic, except that the series is often quite funny. Mr. Stoppard sifts delicious bits of dialogue from the novel’s long, stream-of-consciousness monologues, and he is especially good at drawing out the light comedy beneath all the ill will and betrayal.
When Tietjens agrees to take Sylvia back after she runs off with a lover, he decides that they should move out of their grand town house. The explanation he gives sounds like something Oscar Wilde’s Lady Bracknell would say. “ I shan’t have a house again,” he says. “Anything beyond a flat looks like impudence in a man who can’t keep his wife.”
It is to Mr. Cumberbatch’s credit that he delivers such lines without a smile or a smirk, as befits his unusual character. The actor, who plays a dashing, hyperactive Sherlock Holmes in the recent BBC adaptation “Sherlock,” is almost unrecognizable in this role. His Tietjens is both pompous and self-aware, attractive and ungainly, though never homely enough to justify Valentine’s exclamation, “You’re not so dreadfully ugly, really.”
“Downton Abbey” may be sweeter and easier to follow, but it’s like a new desk stripped and distressed to look like an antique. Next to it “Parade’s End” looks like the real thing, less to modern tastes perhaps, but all the more distinctive.
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February 27, 2013 at 3:03 PM
benedict cumberbatch? sold!
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February 28, 2013 at 10:26 AM
YES! Totally!
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February 28, 2013 at 1:29 AM
2 movies are releasing this friday and all the eyes are on only one movie.
Nana Patekar has given an extensive interview to Tellychakkar.com where he talked about his portrayal of Rakesh Maria and other things concerning the movie.
http://www.tellychakkar.com/interviews/through-2611-we-have-tried-express-kind-respect-we-have-our-police-force-nana-patekar
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February 28, 2013 at 3:10 AM
Dismayed by how veteran actor Sadashiv Amrapurkar has aged, the much in-demand Nawazuddin Siddiqui has decided to take a sabbatical after he finishes his current assignment.
Nawazuddin, who suddenly finds himself inundated with quality work, will take a few months break as soon as he wraps up shooting for Buddhadeb Dasgupta’s “Anwar Ka Ajab Kissa”.
“I waited for 11 years to get good work. Now when I am finally getting the kind of work that I wanted with directors I dreamt of working with all my life, I don’t want to mess up my career by burning myself out,” said the actor who became big after “Kahaani” and “Gangs of Wasseypur”.
“I have been working non-stop and I really need to slow down. I’ve to take a pause to recharge my batteries. So after I complete Buddhadeb Dasgupta’s film, which starts in Kolkata from March 22 and goes on at a stretch for 40 days, I’ll be taking time off,” he added.
Apparently, the need to conserve his energies came to Nawazuddin while shooting with veteran Sadashiv Amrapukar for Dibakar Bannerjee’s short film that will be a part of “Bombay Talkies”.
He said: “I was dismayed to see how old he seemed although he’s just 57-58. We actors tend to give too much of ourselves. And that’s fine. But somewhere we also need to renew our creative energies from time to time.”
It would be a kind of home coming for Nawazuddin when he starts shooting for “Anwar Ka Ajab Kissa” in Kolkata.
“Actually it was that film (‘Kahaani’), which brought me out of my 11-year-old struggle to be noticed. So I consider Kolkata to be lucky,” said the actor.
He would be leaving for Kolkata later this month to look around and get a hang of his character’s milieu.
“I wanted to work with Buddadeb Dasgupta from the time I saw his film ‘Tahader Katha’. It was visually stunning. And also, this brilliant director returns to Hindi cinema for the first time since he made ‘Andhi Gali’. So I had no choice but to say yes,” he said.
At the moment Nawazuddin finds himself so busy he is unable to devote time to promoting his new film “Aatma”, while his co-star Bipasha Basu has started promoting the film.
“I will be starting my promotion soon. I haven’t been able to do so until now,” said the actor.
http://www.india-forums.com/bollywood/hot-n-happening/31298-nawazuddin-to-take-a-break-doesnt-want-burnout.htm
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February 28, 2013 at 3:43 AM
Top politicians like LK Advani and Kapil Sibal attended special screening of Ramgopal Varma’s film The Attacks of 26/11 in New Delhi on Wednesday evening.
Advani it is learnt to have told Varma brilliant a few times in the middle of the screening and was bowled over by the movie. One of his colleagues even suggested that the film should be screened in parliament for the MPs.
Shahnawaz Husain of the BJP told reporters outside, “ Pakistan should learn from this.” Some of the other politicians who saw the film were Ramvilas Paswan , Balbir Punj, Naveen Jindal, Raj Babbar and Jaya Pradha.
Varma tweeted, “Member of parliament Rajeev pratap rudy told me that he wants to arrange a show of 26/11 for all the MPs inside the parliament.”
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/entertainment/bollywood/news-interviews/Top-politicians-attend-special-screening-of-The-Attacks-of-26/11/articleshow/18718285.cms
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February 28, 2013 at 1:59 PM
“Once again I never took a train ride….”
Not that I am trying to “debate” with ya, knowing how you welcome new ideas 😉
But would like to share a real story.
Once upon a time, there was a young, dynamic, super-duper smart and communist/socialist idealist to boot (all those adjectives apply to many here). He had dreams of making lot of orphanages. He was travelling in Europe someplace via train. He was very hungry and didn’t have any food. Something happened and a gestapo’s guy locked our innocent, hungry hero in a dark cell with out food and water. This was communist country. Finally after 72 hrs he got out and out of him all the bhoot of communism came from both sides of ears. He became die-hard capitalist (with tons of compassion) and went on to create lot of wealth and lot of good in country like India and also created many orphanages. He is hero of many youngsters and old people alike. You prolly know him also!
Moral of the story: one should hold on to some ideology and certain ideas upto a point. When evidence presents to you (and hopefully you are personally involved in the situation or hopefully not) then you should also learn to “let go”, “unlearn” or “learn” new lesson. Otherwise one would be come dogmatic, dakiyanusi.
P.S.: we are married to you…in sickness and in health…this sickness part we will tolerate in you. lolz
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February 28, 2013 at 2:40 PM
Not sure what made you believe I’m a communist! This is why one must read things carefully and not just assume stuff based on one’s predispositions one way or the other. I am quite far from any notion of communism. I am actually often not even particularly happy with liberal discourses in most countries if not all. Being a critic of the Right does not mean one can only do so from the position of a committed communist! The problem precisely is that you are unable to think of these things without resorting to this opposite. So an ‘either/or’ deal. As a strategic matter I might prefer voting with the left but that’s a different matter. It’s sometimes about choosing what I consider a better framing of the key issues even though I might disagree with how things are approached within that framing. But your assumption could more or less be re-stated as ‘if one doesn’t vote for the Dems in the US one must be a racist right-winger’!
As for ‘changing one’s mind’ this is a charge that you frequently throw at me but I actually think I am changing my mind all the time. I often don’t have ‘set in stone’ views on anything to begin with. Why does it seem this way to you? Well assuming that you’re completely sincere in this belief it is a question once again of reading things carefully. So let’s take the Abhishek debate. I have said many times I don’t particularly care whether anyone loves or hates Abhishek. Why then do I debate this topic so much? Because I argue with the ‘terms’ in which the dissent comes about. There are lots of other ways of framing an anti-Abhishek opinion that wouldn’t bother me at all even if I disagreed. I might not even argue. The same for Ratnam to offer another example. If someone has serious problems with the entire project or signature that Ratnam represents that’s perfectly. My argument only begins when this opposition is framed in ways that I consider non-serious. I could multiply these examples. I argue against so much Amitabh Bachchan has done from his work to his political interventions and so on tons of times on his very blog. A lot of the criticism has been quite strong (or ‘harsh’) and it’s entirely a credit to him that he doesn’t mind it. But is it likely that I am questioning him so often in so many ways but otherwise promoting a dogmatic approach elsewhere? Once again one must be willing to read.
It’s about the level at which the discussion takes place. So for instance I often have questions about Ratnam’s cinema and I have talked about these in the past but if the debate only revolves around whether he even knows how to make films or at some absurdly simplistic level like that I am of course going to defend him. So in a political discussion if one is talking purely about liberal politics I have very many criticisms. But if the only two choices in a debate are between the left and the right I will without doubt choose the former. But this is a problem with the way the debate is structured. Which is why for instance on this whole Modi issue I started off with a much more expansive comment where I tried to move away from the old divides. And in today’s longer comment I once again tried to ‘globalize’ things.
Finally it isn’t about evidence because I don’t agree with what you define as ‘evidence’. To use a final example there are those who consider the cow simply a mammal that provides great steaks. There are however also those who consider it a sacred animal that ought not to be slaughtered. What’s the evidence either way? It is fundamentally an ethical decision whether one falls in one camp or the other, by way or religious belief or philosophical orientation or whatever. Neither side denies the obvious zoological ‘evidence’ about the cow!
Now when it comes to more political debates it is true that the question of evidence is a lot more thorny. Nazis often genuinely believed that there was clear evidence of what the Jews had done for centuries and continued to do. On the other side there is no document bearing Hitler’s signature ordering the Holocaust. So maybe he wasn’t responsible? The word ‘evidence’ cannot just be thrown out loosely like this. Because it seems neutral but in fact isn’t. There’s always a value system from within which ‘evidence’ is interpreted. And so there is evolutionary evidence arguing against the Biblical worldview on this matter. On the other hand there is the pseudo-scientist creationist view whereby God himself sets the chain of evolution into motion.
Is there a way out of all this? Yes. One must be aware of the assumptions on which one’s argument rests. One can continue to believe them even after such ‘deconstruction’ is done. But as an informed ethical choice and not naively. And so I might not be interested in the films of Pasolini but this is not some objective view. I am aware of ‘why’ I don’t like his films or don’t respond to them. I don’t start saying that he doesn’t know how to make movies (though Fellini came close to suggesting this!).
But again it is always about how the field of argument is being framed. If you told me that the only two choices I had in India were to vote for the BJP or run the chance of installing a Societ-style dictatorship I would choose the former. In a lot of these debates the latter doesn’t come up because outside N Korea it really isn’t a very serious model anymore that many societies are emulating as was once true. But the Fascist danger is still very much alive because we see manifestations of this in various countries in ways in which we do not see evidence of Communism! In the context of SL politics I am all for Tamil identity (even though I am certainly not supportive of the great violence that the LTTE has often chosen as a path.. though as in all such situations the violence perpetrated by the State is not even recognized as such). However if there were a Tamil nation-state I would be far less inclined to treat the same ethic-linguistic nationalism as benignly. So even with the very same subject contexts make all the difference in the world.
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February 28, 2013 at 3:24 PM
The problem with these comments Satyam is that your consistency appears to be confused for obstinacy. Excellent commentary from you top to bottom on this thread today, makes for fascinating reading.
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February 28, 2013 at 3:48 PM
here is to wiping the flowing tears to see this happy Kumbaya on SS ( between the boys) today
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February 28, 2013 at 3:56 PM
thanks much GF..
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February 28, 2013 at 4:17 PM
Meant to say this to you earlier but it would be really helpful for us if you (or GF/Q) could atleast write a para on the film(s) you have recently seen. I, for one, really find it really informative if I get to read them right before/after watching that film. For instance you had The Killer Joe on your current viewing section some days back. Would have loved to get your thoughts on it (not only on the film but also on how you would compare with Friedkin’s earlier works).
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February 28, 2013 at 3:51 PM
Great stuff here Satyam. Really enjoyed reading this. Instructive as always
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February 28, 2013 at 3:56 PM
thanks Saurabh..
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February 28, 2013 at 3:01 PM
“Not sure what made you believe I’m a communist!”
Hey Bhagwan!
Rolling my eyes.
P.S. I will come back later to read, rest of what you said in the article.
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February 28, 2013 at 3:11 PM
“Hey Bhagwan!
Rolling my eyes.’
Hope they give you that inward perspective as they roll..!
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February 28, 2013 at 3:17 PM
LOL
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February 28, 2013 at 3:46 PM
ROFLOL….Satyam…you are too cute…though you wrongly argue most of the time 😉
On Narayan Murthy: It was an analogy…did not mean YOU are communist. Hey Bhagwan!
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