Guru - a missed opportunity

Guru is (supposedly) the life story about Dhirubhai. And you will be convinced about it if you can believe that Dhirubhai (and Kokilaben for that matter) was capable of doing a mean dance step. Actually, I am quite sure that they were quite incapable of it and hence the fact that “Guru” is asininity presented on film.

First of all, the movie does not have the balls to present Guru (Dhirubhai) as the master manipulator that he was. The various ways that he screwed the system are mentioned only in passing and in ways that are more accusatory (even laudatory at times) than based in fact. Eg. The way in which Dhirubhai scammed the government by importing empty boxes and claiming excise exemption is mentioned by a reporter while trying to shoot a false sequence implicating Guru and even there it is interjected by a laudatory line (“Kudos to Gurubhai for making money off of empty boxes”) by a disabled Meenu (Vidya Balan).

Dhirubhai was born to run, he did not know the meaning of “No” and was probably the most arrogant of all businessmen. Bill Clinton was once rumored to have spent 45 minutes talking with him but Dhirubhai himself said that he was willing to fall at the feet of the lowliest government servant if he could get his work done. To truthfully present such a complex character would have taken, at the very least, a dedicated study of the man himself and at least a modicum of honesty to present things as they were. Neither was possible here because mani Ratnam did not even attempt to involve the Ambanis (probably he knew he was making a bollywood movie not a biographical) and ... well, good luck trying to find honesty in our movies regarding powerful people.

Anyways, this would have meant showing Guru as a person who is so obsessed with his goals that he may as well be mad – The movie pretty much kills this by unnecessarily wasting time making Guru dance to forgettable tunes and try to steal kisses from Aishwarya Rai as they share a rented room with her brother.

Can a hero be portrayed as ruthless and still be good? Probably in an Ayn Rand novel. Not in “Guru”. Guru only tersely remarks “The more they try to stop us, the faster we will go”. Even the effort to silence a newspaper owner is pinned on one of his managers. The real Dhirubhai, as everybody know, was much less forgiving towards his enemies and much more proactive in crushing them.

All in all, the movie justly deserved its “neither-a-flop-nor-a-hit” status in spite of great acting by Abhishek and Mithun-da. A movie, which does not have the balls to be honest, deserves a kick in the ass.

Where is Nana ??

Blogging perhaps ?? But no, he isn't lately .....

Nana- saheb, please parat ya ....

Black Friday

Had a glimspe of "Black Friday" yesterday on Youtube and the word "stupendous" comes to mind.

Without going into the rave reviews, watched in its own raw glory, the movie stuns with its pure and raw power of true artistes (artistes != actors; artistes > actors).

Everybody who is somebody in the world of acting (not in the Bollywood , Shah-Rukh Khanian sense of way) is in this landmark effort .... Kay Kay Menon, Pavan Malhotra, Pratima Kazmi, Pankaj Jha .... and many more who will probably be known forever by their roles that they have played here. One most certainly missed Nirmal Pandey and Raghuvir Yadav. It is only rare that a chance comes along that we can see the actors of their stature get a chance in fertile grounds such as these.

A magnificent movie which will most defintely set the benchmark for any further investigative documentary style dramas that may be made in the future in India.

Hope they release the DVD soon for us poor souls in the US.

Salman Mania is back ... and I'm prepared.

After a lull, Salman mania is back with the ass kissers in the media firmly behind him (notice how they hang on to every word that drips from his pie-hole). Here's some graffiti that I had for his group of headlines ....

People think I am an idiot: Salman Khan
That and also that you are a f####in ass*&le. They are right on all counts.

Salman, the lucky mascot!
We prefer Apu

I’m not a romantic guy: Salman
Agreed. You're a bitch.

My marriage is in God's hands: Salman Khan
And your neck too. Hope HE squeezes it real tight.

White man doing Bollywood ... HILARIOUS !!

Found this wickedly funny video of an accomplished mime doing a Bollywood song. I don't know who the mime is but he has defintely captured the inherent gayness of the average Bollywood hero (IMHO almost all of them are really that ... average) who can lip-synch to entire songs. Some of them actually walk away with Padmashrees.



One thing that I really liked about this mime was how he lapsed into a wierd sub-sequence in the song when he cannot seem to find his other song-mate.

Now, we can shake Bollywood filmdom and a twenty dozen instances such as this will fall out, but one sequence I remember vividly (because it had Amitabh in it I guess) which drove me really crazy was a song sequence in Geraftaar where Amitabh Bacchan and Kamal Hasan are singing a song in tandem and each cannot find the oether .... and they are separated by a lousy wall ! Shit, I may be taking this a bit seriously you know but I remember I was actually rolling on the floor laughing at that sequence while all my friends and family members sitting in front of the TV, were looking at me as if I was crazy ....