Lootera: A visual feast

Lootera | 2013 | Directed by Vikramaditya Motwane | Screenplay by Bhavani Iyer and Vikramaditya Motwane

[SPOILERS AHEAD]

Udaan was released a little less than three years ago (I seem to be obsessed with numbers today). VM already appears to be one of those auteurs who take their time to deliver. And boy does he deliver. Lootera is a treat.

I write this after this blog post at F.I.G.H.T C.L.U.B, which contains Vikramaditya Motwane’s very candid and supremely awesome responses to pertinent questions. RESPECT!

• Though it is perhaps still too early to gauge VM’s thematic inclinations, I’m going to try anyway:
  • Stories within stories: VM has a story-fetish (I mean this in an entirely good way). Like Rohan in Udaan, Pakhi (Sonakshi Sinha) wants to be a writer. She delights in reading poetry aloud, and her father tells her a sweet bedtime story when she is sick. For Motwane’s characters, stories seem to offer both escape and reprieve. For the audience, it establishes a bond with the characters. We like stories and so do those people whose stories we’re watching.
  • Rejection of patriarchal authority: In both Udaan and Lootera, the protagonists are trapped in lives that have been chosen for them by patriarchs. In Udaan, Rohan is forced to study engineering and work in his father’s factory. In Lootera, Varun (Ranveer Singh) is an orphan and a thief – we get a sense that this is a destiny chosen for him by his uncle. When Varun tries to ‘escape’ from this ‘prison,’ he dies (a classic noir trope).
• Period films are hard to come by in Indian cinema. Lootera is aware of this. Early on in the film, when Varun enters Pakhi’s world pretending to be an archaeologist, he tells her zamindar father that there is an old civilization buried around the house – he’s come to find it. Though this is a lie, it is an irresistibly resonant lie – ours are times when monuments fall to disrepair. I know I’m reading too much into a minor line, but I want to believe this was a conscious thing. Oh well.
• I’m more comfortable talking about the screenplay here because it’s co-written by the director. The screenplay’s strength lies in the economy of its dialogue – exposition is minimal, and I liked that. In times where voice-overs and flashbacks are the narrative norm, Lootera is a refreshing change. Humor lies in genuinely comic situations (like Varun’s attempt at painting a leaf) rather than slapstick gags. This strength, however, becomes a weakness when the economy is broken. Varun and Pakhi’s occasional emotional outbursts appear jarringly melodramatic and out of place. An example is the first act scene where Pakhi confronts Varun at the ‘archaeological site.’ It seems like it belongs in another film. For a second I thought they were aiming for a 50s tone, but I’d prefer not to go with that assumption because the tone is still inconsistent with the rest of the film. One wishes VM and Iyer had maintained their restraint.
• That said, the aspect that carries this film for its 143 minutes is undoubtedly its visual style. Cinematographer Mahendra Shetty finds ways to use minimalist, natural light in a manner that augments the action in any given scene. I expect one would be tempted to go with cozy yellows for a period narrative like this (especially the first half), but there are moments when he douses the frame in a soft, natural blue (I recall a scene in the library that used both soft yellow and a very natural blue/white to incredible effect). I’m sold. The first half is all doused in a cozy, understated elegance, the second half in a kind of raw and harsh white. Costume designer Subarna Ray Chaudhuri (whose credits include Parineeta) makes Shetty’s task much easier. The scenery chews the scenery.
• The staging of scenes is occasionally reminiscent of Udaan. Like the moment where Pakhi breaks down in her car, and the camera cuts to a wide shot of the car with the mustard field in the foreground – it’s a beautiful shot, but a visual setup very similar to that used in Udaan when Rohan bashes the shit out of daddy’s car.
• A key weakness for me was story. Though I’m the kind of viewer who is a sucker for visual style, the plot in general seemed laid out a little too simplistically – the Interval as usual forces a typical Indian 2 Act structure upon the narrative. First half – heist and fall in love. Second half – the Lootera is chased and love matures. I cannot express how frustrating this neat ‘splitting into two halves’ has become. Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani, Raanjhanaa and now Lootera – just to name a few. I know it’s an industry norm, an imperative, but why? If a viewer likes the film, no amount of soporific fatty foods will keep him or her away. The problem is that it makes the plot immediately predictable. You can sense an intermission moment coming, and it’s maddening – a major turn or reversal has just occurred, and close-ups get closer up and the music rises to a crescendo. Lootera, unlike the other films I just mentioned, is even more predictable than the others because of a trailer that gave everything away, and its publicized incorporation of elements from The Last Leaf. The narrative lacked an element of surprise, and that is what usually keeps an audience hooked – what happens next? At no point did I feel surprised by something a character did, which is my only major grievance with this film.
• One surprise was how Lootera‘s plot, in very basic terms, mirrored that of Raanjhana (which had a more complex story, but fell short on other counts). Both films are about young men who destroy the lives of their loved ones, and then spend most of Act 2 fighting for forgiveness. Tea seems to be the peace offering of choice, which the women in both films dramatically reject. Both films have grooms abandon their brides on the day of the wedding.
• A powerful narrative element emerges from this comparison: one character’s future is almost completely in the hands of another. In Raanjhana, Kundan devotes himself to gaining Zoya’s forgiveness, and she has total control over what his fate should be. He dies. In Lootera, Pakhi can choose to give Varun up to the police, but she doesn’t. In Barfi! too, there is a memorable scene at the end when Shruti leads Barfi away from the special-care home, while Jhilmil calls out Barfi’s name. Barfi, of course, cannot hear her. It’s a moment where Shruti exercises total control over Barfi’s fate – if she so chooses, Barfi will never know that Jhilmil is around and Shruti will have Barfi all to herself.
• Divya Dutta is probably the most underutilized actress in Bollywood. She needs about 3 seconds on screen to make you cry along with her. There’s just never enough of her. Sonakshi Sinha and Ranveer Singh have probably found roles of a lifetime in VM’s hands.
• Re: the music, I felt they ought to have gone with an entirely 1950s-type score. Though Amit Trivedi and Amitabh Bhattacharya create a formidable team and the music is great in it’s own right – it is at times a bit excessive and tends to overpower the narrative. A scene when I felt assaulted by it was the scene when Pakhi and Varun kissed for the first time. Music tends to tell you how to feel. Don’t do that, Music?

I seem to have rambled on. Point is: it’s been more than 8 hours since I watched this film and I can’t get it out of my mind. It’s past 3 AM and I’m inspired enough to keep going on and on. It isn’t a great film, it isn’t a ‘masterpiece,’ but it is an important film in 2013 because it is different. And it’s VM’s second. And it’s stunning to behold.

Don’t miss it?

The Lone Ranger (Bulletpoints): One collaboration too many?

The Lone Ranger | 2013 | Directed by Gore Verbinski | Screenplay by Ted Elliott, Terry Rossio and Justin Haythe | Based on Lone Ranger, a character created by Fran Striker and George W. Trendle

[SPOILERS AHEAD]

Thanks to this friend, I’ve decided to go with the bulletpoint approach. And this is going to be brief, for I’d rather spend my time talking about Lootera.

• In the last decade, these things happened: Longtime writing partners Elliott and Rossio wrote all 4 Pirates of the Caribbean movies and TLR. Director Gore Verbinski directed 5 films, 4 of which starred Johnny Depp and 3 of which were the Pirates of the Caribbean movies. Depp and Helena Bonham Carter co-starred in 5 films, all of which were Tim Burton movies. Dark Shadows – the most recent Burton-Depp-Bonham Carter outing – was a critical and commercial dud.
• What does this mean for TLR? The key creative folks have worked together before. A lot. And this, to me, seems to be the reason this film doesn’t work. It is too assured. It is over-confident, relying heavily on the audience’s level of familiarity with the kind of characters its actors usually play. The film ensures that Depp is allowed to do his dark-screwball-comedy act that made Pirates an enviable franchise. The film ensures that Bonham Carter is allowed to be a weird character with crazy hair. It’s almost like they didn’t know what to do with Armie Hammer because they hadn’t worked with him before.
• The aspect of the film where this over-confidence is most evident is its humor – or lack thereof.  ‘What’s with the mask?’ is a recurring question that characters ask The Lone Ranger. We’re supposed to laugh. We don’t. Comic timing depends heavily on pacing, and the film’s schizophrenic pacing means its comedy suffers.
• Speaking of comedy, most of it relies on the ‘buddy’ dynamic between The Lone Ranger / John Reid (Armie Hammer) and Tonto (Johnny Depp). Unfortunately, Hammer always remains an outcast in the Rossio-Verbinski-Elliott-Depp-Bonham-Carter family. Depp seems to be practicing for Pirates 5. They never seem to settle into their characters, which is unfortunate because they’re both generally fantastic. It’s the way the characters have been devised and written. The Lone Ranger is often reduced to ‘the wrong brother,’ bombarding Tonto with inane questions. That’s good, right? Is that thing sterile? Why am I covered in dirt? Where are my boots?
• It is reported that Elliott and Rossio’s earlier draft (Haythe came in later), involved supernatural elements – we see a glimmer of this in the meat-eating hares, but I’d have liked to see more. The story’s development is indicative of its tonal problems. You got from werewolves to meat-eating hares? What?
• The film is part-Western, part-Whatever Pirates is and part-Johnny Depp. The film is therefore about 90 minutes too long and messy as hell. You have an evil railroad guy, a Native American with a complicated past and a psychopathic outlaw as your secondary characters. Alexander Mackendrick wrote of the density of sub-plots, and this is a heroic effort in that respect. But the Lone Ranger takes a damn long time to become the Lone Ranger, and an even longer time to get a goal. And then the reversals begin. At about 3 times in the second half, the film felt like it was about to end.
• Armie Hammer has a voice that I should like to hear in an animated film.
• James Badge Dale (who plays Dan Reid, John’s brother) is officially 2013’s Handsome Heroic Man Who Gets to Die a Ghastly Death. In World War Z, he is bitten by a zombie and thus shoots himself before he turns undead. In The Lone Ranger, he is shot and has his heart eaten by a not-very-friendly outlaw. Leave James alone, please?
• The Lone Ranger is by no means the worst film of the year (2013 has seen After Earth). But occasionally spectacular visuals cannot salvage a story that doesn’t know what to do with its overblown ambition.

Man of Steel

Man of Steel | 2013 | Screenplay by David S. Goyer | Story by Christopher Nolan and David S. Goyer | Directed by Zack Snyder 

Let me just say that I’m not a fanboy, so I’m not going to talk about how this reboot fits into the whole Superman canon.

Man of Steel begins at the beginning.

Krypton is on the verge of destruction. Good guy scientist Jor-El (Russell Crowe) and his wife Lara (Ayelet Zurer) feel obliged to protect the race. After much ado and a rather tepid face-off with bad guy General Zod (Michael Shannon), Jor-El and Lara manage to plant genetic data into their newborn son Kal-El and launch him towards Earth.

Kal-El, of course grows up to be Clark Kent (Henry Cavill), a wanderer-type who seems to have escaped from Herman Hesse’s depressed imagination. It takes him a fair amount of time to ‘become Superman,’ and it is in this that Man of Steel will test your patience.

We know that this is a reboot, so they’ll want to build (or rather, rebuild) Superman’s character. But I’m not entirely sure Snyder, Goyer and Nolan take the best route:

The film has a lengthy character introduction that continues for nearly an hour. You get to see Clark Kent struggle awkwardly with his powers. You get to see his foster parents Jonathan and Martha Kent (Kevin Costner and Diane Lane) struggle even more awkwardly with his awkward struggles. Flashbacks are piled upon each other until you’re screaming for them to stop.

For the amount of time Snyder-Nolan-Goyer spend building him up, we feel shortchanged. They don’t go deep enough, and Superman doesn’t get dark enough. We know there’s more to Clark Kent, but what is it?

One positive outcome of this onslaught of memory and exposition is that when the action begins, we breathe a sigh of relief. This is where Man of Steel earns its two stars. It unravels with unleashed, unrelenting fury. If we spent the first hour watching Boy become Man, we spend the second hour watching Metropolis – and basically any solid object in sight – reduced to rubble. It’s a visual treat. We’re given the explosions we’re promised. As Susan Sontag said, ‘there is nothing like the thrill of watching all those expensive sets come tumbling down.’

That said, originality isn’t a part of the deal. There are glimpses of The Matrix, Independence Day and War of the Worlds in MOS’ visual style. Nothing that’s going to make you walk out, but it’s there. We see it.

Logic, too, seems to be the last thing on anyone’s mind. It’s obvious that they want to make Lois Lane (Amy Adams) kick ass, but they bend the plot in order to do get her to do so: there is absolutely no reason for General Zod to have asked her aboard his ship at the time of Superman’s surrender. It appeared to be an afterthought both within the narrative and in its construction. If Lois hadn’t been on that ship, the movie might have ended there and then, and this makes the plot feel contrived.

It’s like they want to pile on the pressure and watch Lois buckle.

Henry Cavill makes a gorgeous Superman to look at, but the lack of depth in the story means not much is asked of its actors. Perhaps this is why Amy Adams and Michael Shannon are underutilized. These are not actors easily miscast. Russell Crowe, Kevin Costner and Diane Lane do their bits and go home.

While it’s already been announced that both Snyder and Goyer will return for the sequel, I wouldn’t be surprised if someone new is brought on board in terms of story development. The scale at which Man of Steel is played out – planet versus planet – is going to be hard to beat. How would you make it ‘larger’ than this? One way would be to make it implode. Devise a character-driven story that is ‘larger internally’, but that means…character. Work.

Are Snyder and Goyer up to the challenge?

‘I have such doubts.’

Ankur Arora Murder Case

Ankur Arora Murder Case | 2013 | Story & Screenplay by Vikram Bhatt | Directed by Suhail Tatari

Somewhere, this has been described as a medical thriller.

Let’s just say that the most thrilling thing about Ankur Arora Murder Case is its poster.

This is a medico-legal melodrama. At the film’s center is not a ‘murder case’, but a case of gross medical negligence.

Romesh (Arjun Mathur) is a medical intern at Shekhawat General Hospital, where he is in awe of Dr. Asthana (Kay Kay Menon), a leading surgeon and Worst Human Being Ever. Ankur Arora is an eight-year-old boy admitted to Shekhawat General Hospital for an appendectomy. The surgery goes bad solely as a result of Asthana’s negligence, and the boy dies. The surgeon engineers an elaborate cover-up with the assistance of the hospital’s staff, which also includes Romesh’s girlfriend Riya (Vishakha Singh).

Romesh, however, has virtues. He takes it upon himself to expose the ‘murder,’ and convinces the boy’s mother Nandita (Tisca Chopra) to file a lawsuit against the hospital and Dr. Asthana.

This is a premise that has enough potential to create a thriller. Instead, we’re given a melodrama with enough tears to raise Gurgaon’s water table.

The film rests on one ridiculous incident: Dr. Asthana is foolish enough to declare his negligence to his entire team, therefore exposing himself and us to…the rest of the film. An odd thing to do for a character as sharp as this one.

There’s enough plot here to feed three ravenous directors. Sub-plots are needlessly created to provide motivation, or increase emotional impact. Fringe characters sleep with each other and have their own meandering arcs. We’re constantly pulled away from the main story to the extent that by the end, our emotions are being tugged in about 10 different directions. If After Earth had you rooting for no one, AAMC wants you rooting for everybody.

The film has two clean halves. First half: medical drama. Second half: courtroom drama.

The hospital is where the tension lies. The botched surgery is harrowing to watch, and we feel the film’s potential. Sadly, that’s all that there is – potential. This train derails after the boy’s death, falling prey to the usual traps of Bollywood melodrama. Expository dialogue. Protestations of love, grief and anger. Predictability.

Where the film’s weakness is most apparent is in its depiction of Nandita. She’s the boy’s mother, and the audience’s sympathy will automatically lie with her. There are moments where her grief is restrained, quiet. These moments are powerful; a mother’s self-control, composure after her son’s death. I feel for her. I respect her courage.

But the film fails to capitalize on the strength of her silence. The same character will eventually walk into an operating theater, see a vision of her son’s operation as though she were present when it happened, and will then shed tears on the operating table as though her son’s soul were trapped beneath the leather. Drama on steroids. The only thing that keeps you from cringing is that Tisca Chopra is an excellent actress. Extraordinary, perhaps, for pulling off that scene.

Good actors are constrained by mediocre material. Arjun Mathur is asked to walk in the middle of the road, directly into oncoming traffic to mark an intermission moment and an important life decision. Vishakha Singh is asked to look guilty, sad and constantly on the verge of tears. Kay Kay Menon is asked to scream at people and be everyone’s ideal Hated Doctor. Tisca Chopra is the only one who rises above the material.

Bogged down by poor plotting and excessive melodrama, Ankur Arora Murder Case is nowhere near the film it could’ve been. If people think a ‘new concept’ is all you need in Indian cinema, they’re terribly mistaken.

After Earth

This. Film. Bad. 

This is turning out to be a bad year for science fiction.

I’m not going to say ‘spoilers ahead’ because there’s nothing – absolutely nothing – to spoil.

The film opens with a trailer of itself. Young Kitai Raige (Jaden Smith), in a sequence that involves excruciating exposition and music video editing, gives us Backstory: the human race has abandoned Earth for a distant world called Nova Prime because things happened on Earth that created Danger. Big, scary creatures and things like that.

Kitai’s father is General Cypher Raige (Will Smith) who commands a group called The Ranger Corps. This illustrious group once protected Nova Prime from alien attacks involving ugly-ass Dangerous Creatures called Ursas, who hunt their prey by sensing fear. Cypher mastered a technique called ‘ghosting’, which is this: suppress your fear so that Ursas cannot detect you.

Kitai wants to be a Ranger, but isn’t quite good in the field, as we are to painfully witness first-hand. This disappoints Cypher. Both are ridden with guilt due to Kitai’s sister’s death at the hands – or legs or tongue, whatever – of an Ursa.

Father and son are unable to connect. Enter Mother. Faia Raige (Sophie Okonedo) encourages Cypher to take Kitai along on Cypher’s last voyage, which for unexplained reasons, involves travel in the company of an Ursa (aforementioned Dangerous Creature).

And then, Disaster happens.

An asteroid shower damages the spaceship, which ultimately lands on Earth, which, as we know, is a Dangerous Place.

Everyone except Kitai and Cypher is killed.

The plot, from here on, is pointedly simple: the only way they can get back home is to send a signal into space using a beacon. One beacon is damaged beyond repair. The backup beacon is in the ship’s tail which, in a twist both irritating and predictable, is a hundred kilometers away. Cypher is seriously injured, so Kitai must venture into Danger to Fight Obstacles, Recover Beacon and light the way home.

And so begins a ‘hero’s journey’ so comic and pitiful that you won’t know whether to cringe, laugh or sympathize. I wanted my money back. With interest.

To deal with the failures one by one, let’s start with the biggest.

Character. We spend most of the movie with Cypher and Kitai in a landscape devoid of humankind. If we are to be involved in their enterprise, their story, their life, we need to feel for them. We need to root for them. Instead, we are offered Cypher, whose indulgence in the art of ghosting has rendered him not only fearless but completely devoid of human emotion. And Kitai, who epitomizes incompetence in ways that would put A.J. Clemente to shame.

The aforementioned characterization leads to moments like this: in the early hours of his journey towards the beacon, Kitai must self-administer an antidote to cure himself of the effects of a poisonous leech. Due to a swollen face and reduced motor skills, he lands up administering the antidote only once he faints ON the needle and it pricks him out of sheer luck. At this, Cypher says: Well done, cadet.

Well done, cadet? This is when you say your prayers, Cypher.

The Danger on this post-apocalyptic Earth is hard to take seriously. Babboons? A poisonous leech? A vulture?

The world of After Earth is so shallow and underdeveloped that the audience is made to suffer expository dialogue that is, to my mind, unparalleled in recent history. Take this, as an example of Cypher’s eloquence (slightly paraphrased): Both my legs are broken. One very badly. You have to retrieve the beacon, or we’re going to die.

I really wonder how this got made.

Story by Will Smith?

He’s just won himself an award for the Worst Father of 2013, both in real life and on screen. Will Smith allowed Jaden Smith to do this. Cypher Raige’s idea of ‘bonding’ with this son was to take him on a voyage into outer space with an Ursa on board and without getting weather clearance.

The constant Moby Dick references lead me to only one reasonable explanation. Remember how Lynne Ramsay talked about a venture which was supposed to be like ‘Moby Dick in outer space’? I think someone from M/s Smith & Shyamalan overheard Ramsay at a party and thought, Hey, that sounds like a promising frame of reference for our next epic failure.

Needless to say, Ramsay has nothing to worry about.

After Earth will numb your mind in ways that you wouldn’t believe possible. Blockbuster science fiction often strives for simplicity in its plot, with Joseph Campbell’s monomyth (or hero’s journey) forming the preferred narrative structure.

But when we said simple, Shyamalan and team, we didn’t mean stupid.

Now You See Me

A well-acted, enjoyable study in misdirection.

Daniel (Jesse Eisenberg), Henley (Isla Fisher), Jack (Dave Franco) and Merritt (Woody Harrelson) are magicians with one thing in common – they’re all invited to the same party.

An enigmatic entity brings them together in an apartment, and wows them with a display of stellar magic. They are amazed. Astounded.

The movie immediately leaps forward in time: one year later, the four magicians (now called The Four Horsemen) perform to a packed crowd. Their trick? Rob a bank in Paris. Which is what they do, before a live audience in Vegas.

FBI agent Rhodes (Mark Ruffalo) is tasked to investigate the robbery, as is Interpol agent Vargas (Mélanie Laurent). The two don’t get along at first, but love is obviously in the making. They plunge into a breathless (and highly incompetent) pursuit that also introduces Tressler (Michael Caine), an insurance mogul who backs The Four Horsemen, and Thaddeus (Morgan Freeman), an ex-magician who makes a living exposing the secrets behind magic tricks.

A smooth and entertaining ride? Entertaining, yes. Smooth, no.

The plot relies so heavily on FBI incompetence and the ‘wow factor’ of magic tricks that it can test the audience’s patience. If you ask me to believe that the FBI is going to let suspects in a 3 million dollar bank robbery simply walk away – especially after two of them are being obnoxious as hell – you’re being ambitious. From this point on begins the FBI’s comedy of errors, which is the key tool that moves the plot forward.

Another problem is the number of characters. The film has about 8 characters who are all appealing in their own right. You want to root for them all, but ending up rooting only partly for a few. Daniel emerges as the leader of the Four Horsemen. Rhodes is obviously the leader of the FBI + Interpol  investigating pack. The film has to cut between these two groups, and bends the narrative conveniently to show us what it wants to show us. At times, I wanted more. I wanted to see the Four Horsemen when I was shown the FBI.  I didn’t want to be so carefully and consciously misdirected all the time.

And this brings me to the third issue – one worthy of debate.

This is a film about magicians and magic. Magicians trick and deceive, and mostly by misdirection and stage management. So the film, out of narrative necessity, relies heavily on both these tools of a magician’s trade.

A film, however, is not a magic trick.

While you can play around with your characters, misdirect them all you want – you need to be careful when you attempt to misdirect your audience. While a magician’s audience wants to be deceived, to be tricked, to be wowed by a magician’s sleight of hand, a film’s audience is one that trusts. We don’t watch a film expecting to be deceived or misled.

A counter argument could be that the film rises above the ordinary because it so completely embodies its material – why cannot a movie about magic tricks be a magic trick itself?

Now You See Me opens with a trick that makes the audience participate, not something easily done in this medium. I think that if you win the audience’s respect in the first three minutes, you’re off to a good start.

Mistakes will be forgiven, and they are forgiven.

You’ll forgive the uneven plot because it’s just so much fun anyway.

You’ll forgive the on-the-nose dialogue, because you’ve got a great cast who’re giving it their all.

Caine and Freeman can do no wrong. Jesse Eisenberg adds a dose of charm to his neurotic, fast-talking persona. His verbal duels with Woody Harrelson offer occasional comic relief. Isla Fisher is enchanting. Dave Franco, I felt, was stuck in a rather underdeveloped character. Ruffalo was good, but typical.

The director Louis Leterrier has a solid visual sensibility, which somewhat makes up for uneven storytelling.

It has its problems, but Now You See Me is undeniably entertaining.

Definitely the one you should be watching on this otherwise bleak June 7 lineup.

Review: The Hangover Part III

Lazy, vulgar, racist and exploitative.

I wanted to wrap this up in 400 words, but a rant is a rant is a rant.

So.

In Thailand, the very lovely Leslie Chow (Ken Jeong) escapes from prison, Shawshank-style.

Back in the States, trouble befalls the Wolfpack (Bradley Cooper as Phil, Ed Helms as Stu and Zach Galifianakis as Alan). Alan is being his usual weird, difficult self, and the film’s opening scenes involve the beheading of a giraffe and the death of Alan’s father, Sid (Jeffrey Tambor) – the kind of the stuff that usually happens when Alan’s around.

Doug (Justin Bartha), Stu and Phil, aided by the rest of Alan’s family, stage an intervention. Alan agrees to go to rehab. On their way, they’re accosted by Marshall (John Goodman), a rich crook in pursuit of Chow to settle an old grudge involving several gold bars. Doug is taken hostage, and the Wolfpack must find Chow and bring him to Marshall in order to secure Doug’s release.

Let the Crazy Shit begin, and Crazy Shit it is.

This third (and thankfully, final) installment replaces the ‘hangover narrative’ of the first two films, with a collection of forgettable chase sequences centered around a goal very reminiscent of the first: Lose Doug. Indulge in Crazy Shit. Save Doug. We’re supposed to root for the Wolfpack. We’re supposed to think: Oh man, LOL, that is some Crazy Shit.

Instead, I find myself wondering if this what a 100-minute long lobotomy must feel like.

This is a trilogy that has two installments too many, the avaricious exploitation of a novel idea. These aren’t characters you can root for. The plot of this latest offering (more than the others) rests on a highly implausible assumption: that guys like Stu and Phil would care enough for Alan to stage an intervention and drive him to rehab.

Chow is vulgar and people falling off terraces just isn’t funny anymore. If you have to behead a giraffe, asphyxiate a chicken and strangle two dogs to get your audience to laugh, you’re aiming low. You’re begging. You bring in John Goodman and say, Look y’all, we’ve got a legendary actor who’ll play a legendary bad guy, so please watch this movie and laugh. And then, you lose John Goodman in a perfectly ordinary bad guy. You bring in Melissa McCarthy and say, Look y’all, we’ve got Melissa McCarthy, she’s the funniest thing right now, so please watch this movie, you’ll laugh. And then you pair her character with Alan’s.

I find myself extremely curious about the Craig Mazin (screenwriter) – Todd Phillips (director) equation. Mazin has his roots in a couple of Scary Movie movies, but also participates in the excellent Scriptnotes podcast with John August. Phillips started his career with a documentary on GG Allin and then made a career in mainstream blockbusters. No matter how interesting each may be in his own right, this is simply not my favorite writer-director pairing.

In 2013, people will watch this film. People will laugh. Millions will be made. Cooper will move on to better things, and Galifianakis will drop his pants occasionally.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Alan Garner goes down in history as one of the worst characters of all time.

Fifty years later, people will watch this film again and wonder:

Why?

Review: Fast & Furious 6

Cleverly plotted, action-packed and character-driven, Fast 6 doesn’t let us down. 

I must admit I’d completely given up on the franchise after the exasperating third installment, The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift. But director Justin Lin and screenwriter Chris Morgan have come a long, long way. Practice makes perfect (almost). This is a franchise that knows exactly what it needs to do, and  how to do it well.

In Fast 6, Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel) and his crew are parked in various parts of the world, enjoying the idyllic postscript of Fast 5′s successful heist. Dominic, Brian O’Conner (Paul Walker) and Mia Toretto (Jordana Brewster) live a retired life in the Canary Islands, trying to leave their past behind. Gisele (Gal Gadot) and Han (Sung Kang) are in Hong Kong, unsettled and in love. Roman (Tyrese Gibson) and Tej (Ludacris) live the kind of life one lives when money flows like water.

But alas, idyllic retirement is not meant to be.

Enter Luke Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson), a Diplomatic Security Service agent and Riley (Gina Carano), a key member of his team, who’re hot on the trails of a notorious heist gang led by Owen Shaw (Luke Evans), a former British Special Forces soldier. Shaw seems to have set his eyes on all things military and top-secret. Hobbs pulls Toretto and his crew out of retirement and sticks them where the wild things are: London.

What could entice Toretto and O’Conner away from the Canaries? Letty (Michelle Rodriguez), Toretto’s ex-girlfriend, believed to be dead, has been spotted in London. It isn’t long before we find out that Letty has lost her memory and is now part of Shaw’s crew. Talk about playing hard to get.

The plot is simple, focused: Hobbs, Toretto and Toretto’s crew vs. Shaw and his crew. Shaw’s crew is better equipped and faster; Shaw believes every man must have a code, and his code is precision. Toretto’s crew lacks the resources that are at Shaw’s disposal, but has a code that is stronger: family.

The film wastes no time getting to the point (and to the action). Fast cars, chase sequences, street-racing, one-on-one combat, guns, explosions. The scale of the action grows larger as the film progresses, with the ambition you’d expect of a superhero-movie. And then there’s family, camaraderie and love. Lack of plausibility does not take away from the overall charm of the film, and the end packs a couple of twists that are refreshingly unpredictable.

Where some franchises falter, Fast 6 triumphs: character development. Toretto and his crew are not static humanoids placed into yet  another implausible, mindless plot. They have desires – strong ones – and these desires grow. I liked the attention Lin and Morgan gave to each of their characters, with the exception of Han, who pales when contrasted with Gisele’s fiery personality.

All the actors are at home in this world, and Gina Carano and Luke Evans join the party with aplomb. The action superstars shine: Carano’s combat scenes with Michelle Rodgriguez are a treat to watch, and Joe Taslim (playing Jah, one of Shaw’s henchmen) kicks some serious ass. But the real standout is Gal Gadot, who brings a heady mix of determination and tenderness to Gisele.

Fast 6 is cleverly plotted, action-packed and character-driven. Frequently humorous, it manages to almost entirely avoid the kind of objectification that plagued the early installments of the franchise.

Thank you for evolution.

And as Roman says, ‘Thank you for fast cars!’

Review: The Great Gatsby

Baz Luhrmann, doing that thing that he does…half-heartedly.

The Great Gatsby Poster

We open in a psychiatrist’s office, where depressed alcoholic Nick Carraway (Tobey Maguire) mopes about a man called Gatsby (Leonardo DiCaprio). Then he begins to write a memoir of sorts, and we are led by Carraway’s incessant voice-over into the world of The Great Gatsby. A man of great wealth and mysterious origins. A symbol of wealth, decadence and romance in the roaring 20s. Wall Street at its high. Booze, the Charleston, libertines. Gatsby has a beautiful house (read palace). Throws the grandest parties on earth. And all for the love of his life, Daisy (Carey Mulligan), who lives just across the bay.

Nick enters this world a wide-eyed optimist, and soon becomes a keeper of secrets, swept into the ill-fated love triangle between Gatsby, Daisy and her husband Tom (Joel Edgerton).  He becomes the facilitator.  Thrown into the mix is Jordan Baker (Elizabeth Debicki), a golfer who plays hot and cold with Nick.

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby is one of the most romantic novels ever written. And one of the most tragic. It is not a story that is easy to adapt for screen, and though Luhrmann tries hard enough to do it, his interpretation falls short of the mark. One simply can’t make The Great Gatsby the way one makes Moulin Rouge.

It’s almost as if there were two films here, and we sense Luhrmann’s struggle for style in making the film accessible to his audience. The first film is the one which pushes its own interpretation to the limit – this is the film of opulence, music, booze, dance and fun. The first half. This is where Luhrmann is most comfortable, and where we sense his style. The second film is the one which struggles to find an interpretation – this is the film about the romance, the doomed love, the story’s ‘heart’. The second half. This is where Luhrmann follows Fitzgerald’s plot almost exactly as laid out, but fails to capture its inimitable soul.

Nick’s voice-over was one of the weakest devices used by the film to convey the novel’s impact. It hits you on the head, begging you to think or feel a particular way. Its basic purpose is to build Gatsby, add that air of mystery. But when you start having Nick speak to us as he writes, and also have the words as spoken appear on screen…overkill. But then, subtlety is not Luhrmann’s forte. Excess is his forte. Catherine Martin’s production and costume design is spectacular. The editing is often choppy, sometimes refusing to let us see an image for more than a second.

DiCaprio is good and Edgerton is outstanding. Their scenes together crackle with the kind of unspoken intensity the rest of the movie lacks. Mulligan successfully and charmingly plays the girl she always plays. Maguire is stuck in an uneven characterization of Carraway. Debicki is adept at stealing scenes by slinking across parlors.

While fans of the novel are not likely to like this film, fans of Baz Luhrmann might be disappointed he didn’t go all the way.

Gippi: Coming-of-age, the Bollywood way

Nothing original, but it will leave a smile on your face.

Gurpreet/Gippi (Riya Vij) is a gawky, overweight 14-year-old girl trying to cope with the difficulties of life at school and home. At home, Gippi  must deal with the ‘adult situation’ of her parents’ divorce. She must help her mother Pappi (Divya Dutta) come to terms with her ex-husband’s quick second marriage. Gippi has a love-hate relationship with her brother Booboo (Arbaz Kidwani), who appears to be gay.

At school, Gippi is bunched with other losers: Anchal (Doorva Tripathi) is quiet and struggling with her periods, and Ashish (Aditya Deshpande) is a nerd with a winning smile, in love with Gippi. Shamira (Jayati Modi) is The Perfect Girl – a beautiful bully, and Gippi’s arch nemesis.

Where are Gippi’s love interests, you ask? Kabir (Mrinal Chawla), is a shy, ambivalent new guy in class who quickly becomes an uncomfortable part of Shamira’s gang. Arjun (Taaha Shah) is the quintessential bad boy. Good looking, chain-smoking and in high school (therefore older and with beard). Needless to say, Gippi falls for Arjun.

In the ensuing melee, Gippi must face-off against Shamira in the school’s Head Girl election, and this is what drives the plot.

Now I feel I must point out that I was not very excited to watch this film. The promos involved a flurry of 35-second YouTube videos where Alia Bhatt, Varun Dhawan, Sidharth Malhotra, Arjun Kapoor, Parineeti Chopra and Imran Khan individually talk about meeting Gippi, a marketing strategy that needed to have its head examined. The audience is immediately going to compare the film with Student of the Year. I don’t want to be reminded of SOTY (and in this, I am not alone). Gippi is a movie that tells its audience its OK to be who you are; you don’t have to be good-looking or have a perfect body. What better way to market this story than by having 6 good-looking stars with perfect bodies tell us we needn’t be like them?

Moving on, Gippi the movie has its heart at the right place…almost. It lacks novelty in its take on growing up. Teenager comes of age. First love. First period. Angst. Cool types versus loser types. It’s all been done to death. There are glimpses of Mean Girls, Gossip Girl and Awkward.

Borrowing a leaf out of the very slim book that is SOTY, the film portrays the Head Girl election as a shallow event. The girl with a hot body, popularity, good marks and a boyfriend gets to be Head Girl. I’m not sure Sonam Nair was entirely convinced with this portrayal, and there is an effort to redeem this at the end when Shamira goes into a tirade defending her worth (one of the weakest scenes in the film). It’s quite unclear whether she is defending the shallowness of the election, or saying the election isn’t shallow to begin with.

Gippi works only because of its good intentions and honest performances. Most of the cast is good because they’re given decently fleshed-out characters to inhabit. Riya Vij is just the right mix of endearing and crazy, and Divya Dutta is excellent as usual. Their scenes together are a delight to watch. The real scene-stealer is Aditya Deshpande as Ashish, the nerd with a winning smile. He’s simply adorable. The only misfit is Taaha Shah, whose Arjun seems to have stumbled across Gippi’s St. Mary’s erroneously while on his way to SOTY’s St. Teresa College. Can’t really blame him, though – Arjun’s character is paper-thin and far too black to be convincing.

Gippi is a spirited effort with good intentions and good humor, handicapped by its tired, predictable plotting. Though I may not be a fan of the way it tells its story, I quite like the story it wants to tell.