Wither Bollywood!

I have grown up on regional and Hindi movies. I can't do without watching them however cliched the themes might be. I also need to put some kind of an effort to watch an English movie . Most of my friends were like me around 10 years ago.  Most of them start watching English movies during the engineering phase of 4 years ( even those who hardly watched Hindi movies ).  I was somehow different and Hollywood movies never excited me.  So much so that I did not even watch 5 Hollywood movies in those 4 years.

Over the years however ( especially during the last 2 years), I have started seeing English movies and I find them superior to the Bollywood and regional ones in terms of the stories and ideas. This also might be due to the fact that  I watch an English movie when someone suggests that I should see it as opposed to watching any random regional or Bollywood that hits the screens.

I saw many Bollywood movies in the last 4 months. Just in the last 1 week, I saw 3 of them. I didn't  find anything new or interesting  in 'Ajab Prem Ki Gajab Kahani'. The only highlight of the movie was perhaps Ranbir kapoor who also did a good job in 'Wake Up Sid'.

The less I talk about 'London Dreams' the better. Salman and Ajay are no longer in the 20s or even 30s to do such roles. It is sad that our story tellers don't find stories beyond the routine 'boy meets girl' kinds. If there are 2 male-leads, then it cannot be anything other than jealousy for the lady. Both of these movies, APKGK and LD  should have come 10 years ago. I am not too sure if they would have made an impact even then.

The third movie that I saw last week 'Tum Mile' where the director had at least tried out something different.  The hero meets his ex-girl friend in the face of a calamity where the audiece are taken back to the Mumbai 2005 floods. The theme was contemporary but I thought the story wasn't  too  gripping.

There are too many flashbacks during the 'flood' incident which should have been the most engrossing part of the story.  Ideally, the effect of the flood should have had the audience  thanking God for the clear weather once they stepped out of the cinema hall. Instead, it turns out to be a pretty ordinary movie with a few flood scenes and the 'boy finally meets girl' happy ending.

For me, the last good movie of the season was 'Kaminey'. and I loved watching it. I am a fan of the movie's director -Vishal Bharadwaj and I thought the two characters of Shahid Kapoor were etched superbly. It was good to see a Bollywood heroine look like an ordinary girl without any make-up. Thankfully, there were no dream sequences where the she turns into an angel. I thought it was  Shahid Kapoor's best performance to date and I think he deserves an award for his performance in the movie.

It was interesting to note that the audience had extreme opinions about it. One category of those like me who loved the movie and the other category who detested the movie so much that they felt like leaving the movie half way.  I am planning to buy a DVD tomorrow to make my Dad watch the movie and find out to which category he belongs to.

I have realized that I have been stuck on this post for too long. More bouquets and brickbats later. For now.. I just want to see more 'Kamineys'!

(pic courtesy:http://rakeshzone.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/kaminey12.jpg)