Manjhi The Mountain Man

It is a trend these days to appreciate "non commercial" films to seem smart. What will be your intellect level otherwise? Nothing else can explain why critics have unanimously given this movie a good rating and it is running to packed houses. Hell, even we felt guilty about walking out mid way instead of acting like we give a damn. 

Manjhi is based on true story. Dashrath Manjhi, played by Nawazuddin Siddiqui, breaks a mountain for 20 years to make a small path so that his villagers can access the next village easily. He does this when his wife Phaguniya Devi, played by Radhika Apte, falls down a mountain and dies. 

Bajrangi Bhaijaan

As a rule I don't watch movies of below:

• Salman Khan
• Shahrukh Khan
• Aamir Khan
• Sajid Khan
• Ajay Devgan
• Rohit Shetty
• Farah Khan
• Rajkumar Hirani
• Newcomers like Tiger Shroff, Harman Baweja
• Karan Johar 

That is a whole lot of bullshit out of my life. But KC has a very high tolerance level and wanted to watch BB. I relented on one condition- I get to tweet while watching it.

Below review is for those who are not connected to me on twitter or facebook.

The tweets are in bold followed by my vishesh tipani (smart comments)

Shorts

I don't know how I came across this movie. Don't remember where I read about it- one of the reviews or blogs or twitter. But few days back I marked this on youtube and watched it today.
The movie is like a collection of short stories in one book. How I miss reading short stories. Haven't really read many since school. 

Badlapur

I read positive reviews of this movie yesterday. Some help from twitter and I managed to come across 1 negative review. But Anupama Chopra's verdict sealed the deal and I watched it last night.

The movie stars Varun Dhawan, Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Vinay Pathak, Huma Querishi, Yami Guatam, Radhika Apte and Divya Dutta. It has been directed by Sriram Raghavan (of Ek Hasina Thi and Johnny Gaddar fame). I think Ek Hasina Thi is one of the best thrillers of Bollywood. I loved that movie.

Miss Lovely

I didn't watch this flick in the theatre 'coz the reviews were confusing but I was waiting to watch it on my laptop. Finally, managed to do it last weekend.

The movie is about the C grade movie industry in the 80s. Vicky (Anil George) makes the C grade movies... while Sonu (Nawazuddin Siddique) assists him. Vicky is immoral... he cheats on his wife... sleeps with his heroines... cheats even on his mistress. Sonu does not like doing the dirty work and is trying to break out. The feeling gets intense when he meets Pinky (Niharika Singh)... I don't know when that happens... but Pinky turns out to be a prostitute and breaks his heart. Vicky also betrays him and he is imprisoned. Thats when I switched it off.

Chittagong

This has been on my must watch list for quite sometime. I finally downloaded and watched it.

The movie is set in 1929 in Chittagong (now a part of Bangladesh). It is based on facts. In fact, the protagonist- Jhunku (Delzad Hiwale/Vijay Verma) was alive when the movie was made. It is about the uprising in Chittagong led by a school teacher (Manoj Bajpai) and his band of young rebels (all below 18). They beat the British... not once but twice. Of course, they got caught. Manoj Bajpai is hung while the others are sent to Andamans (kaala paani) jail. On getting released, Jhunku takes up the cause again and in the process loses the love of his life.

Bombay Talkies

This movie is supposed to be a celebration of 100 years of cinema. It is a collection of 4 short films by- Karan Johar, Dibakar Banerjee, Zoya Akhtar and Anurag Kashyap.


Why these 4? I don't know. Zoya is only 2 films old... Dibakar is only 3-4 films old... Do they represent Bollywood? Karan and Anurag do... the former makes formula movies... the latter makes cutting edge movies.

I was not convinced by the concept but the rave reviews pulled me into the theatre.