A typical horror story with some good sequences – because the director has a hangover of RGV and Ramsay both. Nothing great, but you will not feel cheated too. The acting is a different case though.
Aah.. Horror and Bollywood. Time and again Bollywood film makers have dabbled in horror movies and have come up with mixed results. First it was the Ramsay Brothers, who actually did make some good movies, if you take away the small budget jeepers creepers that they provided, then it was Ram Gopal Varma, who supposedly changed the way Indians looked at horror movies, then it was the Bhatt camp, which added some subtle erotica to the entire aspect of horror – which was nothing new for those who saw those bathroom scenes in Ramsay movies – and now there are several film makers who see occult and films on occult from a kind of holistic view, where they try to build a bridge between the so called ‘andh vishwaas’ and ‘science and medicine’ crowd.
Mallika is none of that.
Mallika is a small budget, unambitious movie that can be any of the Ramsay Brother movies with a new camera, a new starcast and a somewhat mature market. There’s this character who has nightmares and hallucinations about something bad, and therefore decides to take a break. When she does finally, she travels to a old fort which has been turned into a resort, but not before meeting the evergreen Saamri as a truck driver and a creative director of somewhere who has to travel to the resort so they can create a report for his magazine – ah, if all creative directors could do that.
Anyway, there are the prop characters who are destined to die as the movie progresses, and die they do. It is finally found out that there’s an aatma in the resort and that’s the dudess who’s killing all these people. How and why is found at the fag end of the movie, and there is nothing new about that storyline as well.
However, for a low budget movie, the direction is quite good, especially those scenes that try to jumble the past happenings and the present. Another very interesting sequence is where you see one character coming out of a room and sitting down, and then seeing herself doing the same actions again – something like an out of body experience. What’s interesting about this scene is that the director has kept the audience in a kind of suspense about who the real person is and who the ghost is.
Another likeable part of the movie was the initial background score, which was nothing but scrambled dialogues from the past life, in a very slight echo. This gives a very good backdrop when you are beginning to watch the movie.
Mallika also has a solitary CGI scene, which is actually quite good, and shows that Bollywood has come a long way from the Jaani Dushman ka 3D Max ka skeleton. There is one or two more, but I am not sure whether it was trick photography or CGI, but anyway they weren’t anything to write home about.
Oh and of course, there’s a lot of skin show if you are interested in that – but only females, no males.
I review the entire movie in this one scene. Read it to believe it:
Rhea has prepared spaghetti for the kids. The kids throw the spaghetti at her. No, it’s not like just dunking it at her, they actually paintball her with the spaghetti. Finally frustrated, she tells them to stop it or she will smack them. You know what the thirteen year old kid gets up and says? You cannot touch us, you are not my mother.
This is like a thief telling the police officer that they cannot haul the thief to the station even if the thief is caught red handed with money bags bulging out from his knapsack, because ‘he wants to see a lawyer at the crime scene itself.’
Marital discord has been the favorite subject of several producers and directors over the years, with some of the best stories in Indian cinema weaved around the complex intricacy that is an Indian marriage. Since the past few years, Karan Johar has tried to make this niche his own, starting with love stories and then with relationship movies. We are Family is his latest offering, directed by Siddharth Malhotra and presented under the Dharma Productions and UTV Banner. Here’s the review:
Aman (Arjun Rampal) and Maya (Kajol) are a divorced couple with three kids, a thirteen year old and two kids who seem to be under ten, their age is never disclosed. Aman is in a relationship with Shreya (Kareena Kapoor) and wants his ex-family to accept her, so that they can be a big happy family. However, nothing goes as planned and the family rejects Shreya for reasons unknown at the first meeting. However, fate (or busy schedules) have them meet again and then the journey of acceptance and adjustment begins.
The movie starts with a song which seems forced, and immediately puts us into a scene where Aman is the typical father who’s late for his daughter’s rendition of something. It is revealed after a moment that Aman and Maya are divorced and that he wants Maya and the kids to meet Shreya. Everything moves so fast that you are untouched with what’s happening onscreen. One moment Aman is waltzing in a open top vehicle and the next moment he is playing daddy dearest to three kids.
If you look at it closely, We are Family can be considered as a sci-fi movie, because none of what is portrayed in the movie happens in the third rock from the sun. Consider these scenarios:
Rhea has prepared spaghetti for the kids. The kids throw the spaghetti at her. No, it’s not like just dunking it at her, they actually paintball her with the spaghetti. Finally frustrated, she tells them to stop it or she will smack them. You know what the thirteen year old kid gets up and says? You cannot touch us, you are not my mother. This is like a thief telling the police officer that they cannot haul the thief to the station even if the thief is caught red handed with money bags bulging out from his knapsack, because ‘he wants to see a lawyer at the crime scene itself.’
Another outworldy aspect is the very premise of the movie. The divorce was four years back. Maya seems quite happily busy with her children, and in fact it seems that she has accepted the fact that her ex-husband will be available when he will be available. What then makes the kids act so gregarious around Rhea? It’s four years man… everyone learns to walk away after four years.
Then, there is this sequence where the thirteen year old sneaks out of her home for a sleepover party, which has boys and beer, and when the parents get her home, she shouts at her mother. Dude, if ninety percent of thirteen year old kids did what this girl does in the movie, she’d spend her entire life in a juvenile home – not get pampered with a flower petal nail polish at the end of the movie.
Of course, the award goes to Kareena Kapoor’s character, Rhea who actually gets a soft spot for the kids even after they have rejected her, embarrassed her and done everything else to her other than physical violence. She is the one who argues with Aman when he tells her that she is not to meet the kids without Maya’s supervision. Sweetie, not meeting your married beau’s kids for all your life is a good thing – believe me.
The film takes a page out of Ekta Kapoor’s books, when the thirteen year old grows up to be married, and Kareena Kapoor looks like it all happened yesterday, and Arjun Rampal looks like he’s sown and reaped all his oats. There’s that hint of sexism, a woman is never allowed to grow up – she should always be dolled up. Oh, and Maya’s character gives some diatribe about how career women are stupid.
And whoever conceptualised, sung, and give a go ahead for that Jailhouse Rock ripoff should never be allowed within a yard of anything musical – ever, no, not even an audio cassette.
These and other small things about the movie – like the people deciding to keep a black and white copy of a final family photo, taken with a Canon professional camera, makes us conclude that this is a sci fi movie. Watch it at your own risk, yaaron!
On the risk of being too repetitive, I shall say this again:
Bollywood makes pathetic Superhero movies.
Apart from some cult classics like Mr. India, Chota Chetan, and then the financially successful movies like Ajooba, Jaadugar, etc, the only presentations we have about superhero movies are Drona, Koi Mil Gaya and Krrish. Koi Mil Gaya was pretty good and Krrish may have decided to cater to only a very narrow market – the ten year olds – but other than that, we have nothing.
So, when Kites was just something that ‘dekhna padega’ and we were meandering along the path with Paathshaala and other movies, the posters of Zokkomon came up. They showed Darsheel Zafary (Taare Zameen Par) wearing a red and white costume and standing atop a terrace or something, and yes, it’s a Walt Disney movie. Of course, our curiosity was aroused and we looked for the release date – May, 2010!!! Yay!!!
So, we started looking for any synopsis, songs, first looks etc that we could share with our fans, but nay, we did not get anything. Till today, there’s just a single paragraph synopsis of the movie, about a orphan who is left alone in the cruel world and finds something to solve the issues in his life.
Word was out that the release of the movie was postponed because everyone was waiting for Kites, and now with Kites becoming one of the biggest duds of the decade, we are waiting for all the movies that it stopped in their tracks. Until then, see this promo that’s hit YouTube:
