Fida

An account belonging to a major underworld don has been hacked into, and has been totally wiped out (around 220 crores!). Cops, media, and the said don all are very upset. [Scene change] Boy (Shahid Kapur - new promising kid on the block) sees girl (Kareena Kapoor). Boy goes ga-ga over girl! Boy convinces girl she is the girl of his dreams. Girl embraces boy. Boy starts singing/dancing etc. After much songs - story goes for a twist. Girl has financial problems (around 6 crores worth). Boy decides to rob a bank. Boy goes to the bank, sees another dude (Fardeen Khan) withdrawing a huge amount from the bank (around 7 crores - how convenient!). Boy decides to steal from the dude. And so the twists pile up on twists with a final twist at the climax!

Sounds thrilling? It cudda been!

The best part about Fida is that it clocks in at an amazing 2 hours and some change (and the songs are easy on the ears too). But the proceedings tend to disappoint every time you think the excitement level is going to notch up a little. Pacing is uneven, and the performances are inconsistent. Shahid Kapur has good screen presence and is a hit with the ladies, but his future strictly depends on his shrugging off the SRK hangover. Kareena Kapoor and Fardeen Khan are just OK. Make no mistakes - this is a director's vehicle, and Ken Ghosh seems to have lost his enthusiasm for the project somewhere after the first few reels.

Watched Fida without any particular expectations and was not surprised by anything in it. This is an ordinary fare at best which is worth a one-time watch. The story is full of clichés, such as unconditional love and how a loving guy would give his life for a girl, how he gets accused for no fault of his own because of her and so on. Ken Ghosh's direction is nothing great. The script does not add much and at points it is ridiculous. After the so-called twist through which the truth is revealed, the film turns into a thriller but this part is heavily flawed and unconvincing, though it does have some entertainment value and suspense. The film's main protagonist is played by the very young Shahid Kapur, and the guy evidently tries very hard to do the best of what he was given. Although in terms of acting he was not there yet (as he is today with such performances as Kaminey), you can't but appreciate his efforts. Kareena Kapoor plays the bad girl probably because she noticed it was a trend for leading ladies to play negative roles. This role is sort of a take off on the many roles played by Bette Davis, but Kareena does a forgettable job. That's not entirely her fault because her role was not well written. Fardeen Khan is bad as the bad guy. The music of Fida does not stand out but I liked "Nazar Nazar" a lot as it was melodious, and I enjoyed "Maine Jisko Chaha" to an extent. Otherwise the film is simply better to avoid, with the ending being particularly pathetic. Do not expect much from Fida.

The subject of the film was very interesting, but the film wasn't treated well enough. I felt that the main twist when Shahid finds out that he has been betrayed was unfolded too soon in the storyline. And after that the film dragged up to the climax. Even the climax was not as 'shocking' as it was made out to be. The ending is not satisfying, it seems abrupt. For the exception of Kareena (who was awesome) no other actor delivered a great performance. Shahid was fine in the first half, but he seemed completely lost in the second half. And what was the reason for him to imitate Amitabh Bachchan in the finale (I wonder if anybody else noticed that). Fardeen was just about okay, he played the role of the suave Vikram nicely. This is Kareena's best performance to date. She looks gorgeous and makes a great looking pair with Shahid. The actor who played the don was horrible. He hammed throughout the film. The songs are good specially Maine Jisko Chaha and Aja ve mahi. Cinematography is fantastic. The film wears a posh and classy look throughout. Fida doesn't live up to my expectations 7/10.

(2004) Fida (In Hindi with English subtitles) CRIME DRAMA/ PSYCHOLOGICAL

It opens with a mob magnet, Babu Anna (Akhilendra Mishra) throwing a temper tantrum finding out that the electronic theft of more than 5.3 billion rupees stolen between two banks was money belonged to him. He then demands his goons to find the identity of the culprit and have it or them bright over to him. The movie then switches to love sick romantic, Jai Malhotra (Shahid Kapoor) bonding with his best friend, Sonia (Kim Sharma). And as soon he spots a girl he becomes madly in love with, he then goes out of his way to find out everything about her, including where she lives, we find out her name is Neha Verma (Kareena Kapoor). And for the first 40 minutes or so, we then see Jai profess his love for her in the most cringe worthy way before he tells her that he would even commit suicide for her. He does and Jai's best friend, Sonia then drags Neha from her place to the hospital to show he was was not kidding. It was during then is when the ridiculous begins to happen. It is when some men were seen leaving her apartment, and Jai catches Neha attempting to hang herself. She then tells him that she is the daughter of the father who owed money, and thought hanging herself would be a solution. And as soon as she tells him how much she owes him or them, and turned out to be a huge amount of 60 million. Jai promises her he would get her that money without robbing the bank. And upon going to the bank he then sees a guy withdrawing a lot of money, and he decides to follow him to his place of residence, only as he soon as he comes inside, jai is then caught and knocked unconscious. By the time he gains unconsciousness, Jai then tells the wealthy resident, Vikram Singh (Fardeen Khan) the entire situation and story. Vikram then tells him he will gladly give Jai the money he needs, providing he will be the scapegoat of the person who robbed Babu Anna 5.3 billion on line. And Jai then goes online on some library - and almost immediately he gets caught as soon he is instructed to type things on the computer, as it is not long he gets nabbed by authorities. A twist happens is when Jai manages to escape when a shootout ensures when Baba Anna instructs his goons to get involve into his capture so that he himself is able to punish Jai himself. After Jai manages to escape the clutches both of the police and by Babu Anna's goons, by the time he reaches Neha's apartment. He then sees Neha coming out of the shower with Vikram right behind her. Giving Jai and it's viewers the assumption that it was nothing more but a set up all along. As if both Vikram and Neha knew all along Jai was going to take the bait, as well as it was both of their plan to get Jai follow Vikram all the way to the bank for the intention of robbing hi, is way too much of a coincidence. Motivating I as a viewer to ask more questions than I was getting any answers.

This movie is one of the most chameleon-like I have ever experienced. That's not to say I didn't enjoy it; but the mainly relaxed, whimsical, romantic opening (after the first encounter with the crime boss, who almost then seems to get forgotten for about 40 minutes, though you know he must resurface sometime) is filled with extravagant Bollywood dancing (though often with a more sexy feel than I have usually encountered in my so-far limited Bollywood experience) and over-played but highly amusing protestations of love on the part of the main character, Jai. In this portion, the aficianado of Bollywood ladies has plenty of opportunity to admire the very sexy Kim Sharma as Jai's childhood friend Sonia, and also of course his new love Neha played by Kareena Kapoor, who is more restrained in her sexiness but just demurely lovely. But after about 30-40 minutes, the pace and tone completely changes with one dramatic moment, and after that we are very much engaged in a helter-skelter action movie with multitude plot twists, wide-ranging shifts of location from India to Dubai to South Africa and even (I think) a small vignette in London, and a fair share of unarmed combat and exploding gunshot wounds. This is not a movie for the faint-hearted or the lover of simple romantic Bollywood stories, but overall it is an enjoyable ride!