SRH ke Cholaaaaaaay - Part 2

Continuing my post from last week, here’s more inside scoops on how some of our distinguished directors were planning on re-making the classic Sholay.

4. Farah Khan:

The focus shifts on-campus. Jai and Veeru played by SRK and a long haired Zaheed Khan are young freshmen at a colorful high school located in Panchgani but filmed in Malibu, California. They work part time in the school cafeteria and are just able to afford the bare necessities in life, a Rolex watch, a new red Enzo Ferrari and clothes designed by Versace. Popular with girls they are the life of every singing dancing event in school. This film has everything, a forgetful Thakur who’s the ex-school principal, his hard core party going daughter in law, Gabbar who’s the head of an evil Fraternity that wants to put an end to World peace using Kryptonite and a Merc cab driving Basanti. Also features, a parallel story line about how Jai and Veeru are in reality not only long lost brothers working undercover as students but also miraculously turn out to be the Thakur’s sons.



5. Sanjay Leela Bhansali:

Radha (Rani) is deaf and blind, Basanti (Aishwarya), the Thakur’s daughter drives an old Rolls Royce, Jai (Amitabh) is a forgetful aged teacher, Veeru (Salman) almost drinks himself to death for the love of his life, Thakur (Vikram Gokhale) is an old generation classical singer living in a grandiose haveli and Gabbar (Devgan) was Thakur’s ex-student who fell in love with the Thakur’s daughter and thus was banished from the haveli. At the end of 100 glycerin bottles and being hurtled thru the time-space conundrum from one lavish poetic set to another, the audience is left befuddled and in tears. The movie ends up winning the best filmfare and is India’s official entry into the Oscars.

RGV ki Aag

Anyways, I did end up watching RGV ki Aag last weekend. And believe me when I say this but it definitely is the worst film ever made. RGV came close with his remake of Shiva as well as the irritating James but he has topped himself. This is a cult classic, almost comes close to the Gunda, the epitome of everything that could go bad in a movie. However at least Gunda entertains with its inert stupidness and cheapness, RGV ki Aag does neither. Its the one movie that I could not even watch beyond 20 minutes, and the very fact that RGV had the insolence to claim its a remake of the best hindi movie ever made is sheer blasphemy. The camera angles that RGV uses as a director is an insult to film-making. Whatever happened to the guy who once made Rangeela, Satya and Company.

Heyy baby

Well since we could not tolerate RGV ki Aag beyond 20 minutes, we ended up watching Sajid Khan's disaster so called family comedy "Heyy Baby". Now this is a guy whose only fame to claim beyond being Farah Khan's brother was the show that he hosted in the 90s making fun of hamming in movies. Heyy baby was one of the worst comedies I have ever seen in my life. A cheap re-make of the excellent 3 Men and a Baby, this movie is both cheap and un-funny. The actors do a decent job, but the scriptwriters were probably on vacation. Imagine a movie about a baby, featuring item girls and stressing thru the movie on one night stands. Family film my foot. Besides this he's made it into an emotional melodrama towards the end. Sigh, the Karan Johar influence never stops does it.

Dhamaal

Another remake of an English movie and inspirations from a dozen other. Creativity is dead in Bollywood. Maybe they could just release the dubbed versions in India, they would at least be good. Fortunately I wasnt able to watch till the end of this movie but this movie was way over the top, almost as much as Partner. I still want to watch this movie till the end.

1. Basic Premise - Its a Mad Mad Mad World.

2. Scenes Copied Frame by frame from - Road Trip

3. Zip It scene - Austin Powers

4. Scenes of Mr. Bean

5. 3-4 jokes were popular Sardarji jokes that you must have heard as a kid

And all this was within the first hour of the movie. This is the first movie ever that I have differed with Rajeev Masand's views.

Phew, thats enough of Bollywood for a month, I need to recover some of my senses after watching all the nonsensical fare dished out. Well the Indian team is doing pretty well in the World Twenty20 cup as we speak, so will have something on that front next. ;)


ps: * SRH -> Sourabh R Herwadkar