Ishqiya

One of the mind-blowing movies I watched lately. Absolute originality and boldness of the plot hit you like a splash of cold water. Its razor-sharp characters and unconventional plot keep you hooked till the end. Very well-cast movie with Vidya Balan stealing the show inspite of the presence of seasoned veteran Naseeruddin Shah and Arshad 'Circuit' Warsi .A special mention to the totally awesome music by Vishal Bharadwaj!

HP6-A Compulsive Lacklustre

This is the most inactive phase of my vacation,I daresay,what with my Mom's superstitious streak preventing me from going out as freely as I used to,due to the unexpected death of a family member although a 'door-ka-rishtedar' (With all due respects,may the soul rest in peace!!) dampening my vivacious plans of shopping for the semester ahead which I carefully planned for this part of the vacation...Sick of arguing with her,I started finding my solace in books and movies besides working "occasionally" for my Shaastra event...The progress I made on "Books and movies" front has been particularly very promising by any of the characteristic Sush-standards...I managed to finish reading both 'Deception Point' and 'Twilight' in a li'l about 2 days besides inflicting terrible neurotic trouble on myself watching the sloppy and nonsensical 'Kambhaqt Ishq' and a distorted yet entertaining HP6...HP&HBP has been a nice outing at Prasad's with my insti friend,Shreya...This tempts me to briefly review this movie...

Opened to mixed responses, HP6, I felt didn't quite justify the book although the screenplay of adaptation was brave enough for a book which talks about a whole lot of things...Harry's (mis)adventures with the Half Blood prince, evolution of Tom Riddle from a 'different' child 'who could make things happen to people who are mean to him' to ominous (for want of better adjective) Lord Voldermort, Horcruxes,Harry's budding relationship with Ginny, his friends' adolescent blues etc...All that was managed to be constricted in a duration of about 150 mins is a li'l something of everything...Yet,sadly falls short of pleasing a loyal Potter fan...Its not devoid of the magic moments though..Who doesn't love the tongue-in-cheeky Harry riding high on luck with Felix Felicis to extract that one vital memory from Prof.Slughorn!! Truly charming performance by Daniel.That hostile and rare defensive look on Hermoine's face when she's outsmarted by Harry in Potions class,Cupid-struck Ron,flamboyant Dumbledore who wonders openly if Harry is seeing Hermoine,Weasley twins' new shop in the Diagon Alley and a fitting climax on the island are all the stealing moments of the flick...Jim Broadbent is well cast as Horace Slughorn,the new Potions master...Tom Felton surprises you with his mature performance as Draco on Dark Lord's mission...The major glitches which disappointed me are-the under-dramatized death of Dumbledore which didn't have quite the same effect of Sirius's demise in HP5, certain major characters like Snape and Hermoine had not much to do,Harry-Ginny relationship not well portrayed,the various premises of the story are not very tactfully dealt with leaving the audience with a loosely assembled puzzle set...The bottomline is,the film fails to be qualified as perfect,not exactly because of any cast or crew misfits,as a matter of fact some characters leave a nice impact on you long after leaving your seat,but out of compulsion to serve a lot on a limited platter...I definitely don't regret my 150 min outing in a pleasant company watching it on one of the biggest screens of India...

And I'm riding high as my mom's unofficial curfew is gonna be lifted tomorrow back home..

New York

A Bollywood attempt to interpret the global scenario post 9/11 in USA...Yet it is not all that Bollywood in spirit...It can be called offbeat yet interesting and entertaining-the genres that rarely sync well and strike a chord in India...Its a poignant tale of three friends-two Americans of Indian descent,Sameer and Maya later joined by Omar from New Delhi in the New York State University...Omar gets to see a whole new Occidental world marked by boundless freedom and sophistication starkly contrasting his traditional Delhite upbringing...Uber-cool dude Sam and a dream-like Maya help him become one among them.When its time to leave the university,Maya realises that Sameer is her man leaving Omar heart-broken which compels the latter to leave New York...Seven years later,Omar wakes up to FBI raids in his house on the suspician that hes acting as an aide to his terrorist-turned friend Sameer and now,to avoid an almost death-like detention,he is asked to help FBI as its undercover agent...When he learns that Maya and Sam are now married happily with a son,he decides that he will take up the offer and prove to FBI that Sameer ain't any terrorist...The consequences of Omar's decision form the rest of the story...

The backdrop of this movie is a series of detentions FBI carried out on Muslims even at the slightest suspician post the twin tower destruction by Islamic fundamentalist organisations... The amount of horror and humiliation these detainees are subjected to is poignantly conveyed...The debates at various places between the FBI officer Roshan and Omar put forth some interesting justifications for such operations...Most imporatantly,the film doesn't take any stands...It obediently presents the motivations of duty-ridden FBI and passion-ridden 'so-called' Jehadis...

Actors,very well-cast, are the biggest assets of this movie and leave an indelible impact on the audience...John(Sameer) as the university 'star' who later undergoes terrible trauma as a terrorist suspect shows amazing variation pre and post 9/11 and steals the show...Katrina(Maya),as a vulnerable wife silently aware of her husband's terrifying motives and a Human Rights activist produces a rare act given the history of her earlier films...Then Irrfan Khan(Roshan) as the South-Asian FBI officer gives a taste of some casual yet effective acting...Last but not the least, Neil(Omar)-my perosnal favourite-as a loyal friend,distressed lover and a Muslim in dilemma,dishes out quality stuff...I mean it when I say there is not a single frame that doesn't contribute to taking the story forward...Its a very genuine,strong ,brave and sincere film coming from the director,Kabir Khan who is said to have been a victim of this discrimination, he so effectively captures in the movie...Hail Kabir!!!