Dhan Dhana Dhan Goal

I am always a sucker for movies about sports, and this is no exception. Went by for a premier show, and I wasn't disappointed. Although I can't say that I'm blown away either. The producers ran into copyright issues with the title of the movie, and had to change it at the last possible moment. I would really have been drastically disappointed had this been a rip off from Santi Munez's tale in GOAL: The Dream Begins. Thankfully it wasn't. Instead it is *inspired* from another old movie named Major League featuring Charlie Sheen, the only difference, that was about baseball, and this is soccer. Add to it some Bollywood masala, and you got yourself a classic.

The story is simple. There this town Southall, which is basically an Indian community, and they have their own movie theater. But they have failed to pay for their soccer grounds and the city community wants to sell it off. So the only way to save their grounds is to win the championship, something that the club hasn't managed a single time. But as it turns out, they get the team together, and somehow pulls it off. LOL, there is a interesting side plot featuring John Abraham's character and his family history, also an interesting scene in the Old Trafford dressing room. It's always nice to see the Theatre of Dreams.

Bipasha Basu is excessive corny than necessary. John Abraham flaunts his biceps throughout. Arshad Warsi gives a reserved performance, Boman Irani is fantastic as ever. There's also real nice performances from Rajendranath Zutshi and Dalip Tahil. Yet, at the end of the day it fails to live up to hype. It happens to be a sad remake of yet another lesser known Hollywood movie. The music is good, although sometimes it feels blatantly unnecessary. The camera work, cinematography is good. And those soccer skills owns !! 8/10 !!!

When I went to watch this movie, I knew that it was based on "soccer," which is like a national sport in this country and almost everyone, no matter what religion, caste or colour they are, support a team, whether it is in the Premiere League or even a local league. Every Saturday or Sunday and sometimes during the week days, many people go to watch their teams play.

Shaan, captain of a local team, Southall United, is struggling not, only just to help the club to survive, but also help the players who are all Asians - Indians, Pakistani and Bangladeshi. One day, he is called in a meeting to be informed that the club may be demolished due to financial reasons. But he promises the owner that he will do whatever he can to make sure that this doesn't happen. Unfortunately, the owner soon passes away and it is up to Shaan to take control. He then goes in search of an ex - Southall United player, Toni Singh as he believes that he can save the club from closure. On re - building the team spirit, one of the players, in search of a physiotherapists, suggests Rumana, who is Shaan's sister. She agrees and during training session, she informs Toni that she has a good striker in mind but who is currently playing for their rival.

Dhan Dhana Dhan Goal is s movie that is purely based on soccer and stars John Abraham, Bipasha Basu, Boman Irani and Dalip Tahil, Arshad Wasi, directed by Vivek Agnihotri and is written by Anurag Kashyap. John Abraham, whose films have not done really all that well this year, has for sure proved that he is talented by giving a good performance and fits the role very well. The same goes for Arshad Wasi. But Bipasha, who, while promoting the Taj Mahal for the Seven Wonders of The World, was photographed kissing the Manchester United striker, Christiano Ronaldo, and was rumoured to splitting with John Abraham, has very limited role in this movie. But another actor, who has proved his versatility, in movies such as "Lage Raho Munnabhai", "Munnabhai M.B.B.S" and "Don - The Chase Begins," Boman Irani, is again good in this movie and has proved that he can play his roles of an aggressive character very well. Vivek Agnihotri has also done a good job of the direction as has Anurag Kashyap in writing it.

This is a very well researched made movie, in terms of research as well and what has made it better is that it was almost entirely filmed at London's Chelsea Football club, one of the current top teams in this country. The grounds used were those of the club. Howeve, in one scene, Manchester United Football Club can be seen and one scene is filmed inside the "museum" area where there are names, etc, of the players who were killed in the Munich air crash. The film makers were reported to have received a lot of help from Chelsea Football club and there were reports that some of the Chelsea players even kicked the ball around with some of the cast. But this movie has also shown reality and what some foreign players come across on the pitch - racism. Only recently, some players did complain that racism does exist stands where fans call some of them "names." But there are procedures that enable this to be stopped whenever possible. Also, what was correctly shown is that Indians, Pakistanis and even Bangladeshi people, born in this country do support various teams. The songs are not bad at all considering that there are not many.

Since this movie has drama, tragedy and romance, it is a good movie and more so if you enjoy watching soccer.

OK, first things first, India has cricket as it's unofficial national game (kabaddi, ask any1 here and u'll get a blank face). But still, soccer is ultra popular in West Bengal and small factions...So, the chances of this movie doing well were always bleak, and so it didn't do well, but this film was good....i mean GOOD...John fitted the role of a racially abused striker almost perfectly, Arshad was a little sidelined towards the end, still he played a matured role with enough maturity.The team was full of oddballs, but Boman pumped them up, okay, that ManU bit was a bit overboard, still good...U get inspired from champs, don't u...Bips was there just for bollywood style fun...the babe in the item song was uber hot...Arshad's wife was well casted and enacted, and the tale of Southhall's fan was a good twist to the same old tale...The finale was gr8...Overall, a good sports drama...and those who think what happened to John doesn't happens nowadays, wake up idiots, don't u see what the aussies did to India...

i love soccer. i don't normally watch bollywood movies other than the few good ones that get out in a year. however, because of the football angle i decided to give this movie a shot. i suffered. john and bipasha have proved beyond doubt they can't act and the idiotic and shallow characterization only makes it worse. this movie's script/dialog/screenplay/direction is so bad it makes boman and arshad look bad. now those two guys really have a flair to enliven proceedings but even they cant save the movie here. probably the only sensible thing they did was get a soccer choreorapher or whatever the guy who sets up the soccer play is called. but then that also is driven by such a clichéd script it is really not worth anything. if you like football you'd rather just switch to a champions league match to get your dose of soccer action. i rate it 1/10 for making such a bad movie about a sport i love. after this movie i puke every time i see bipasha.

Let's start with the most important question-Is this a bollywood version of GOAL (2005) starting Kuno Becker? Well, it's definitely a no. And now to the other important question-is it as gripping as its Hollywood counterpart-the answer again is no! But that doesn't mean that DHAN DANA DHAN GOAL isn't watchable. It's an average movie with some interesting sequences.

Set in London (and in particular the South Asian hub Southall), the story revolves around a bankrupt football club-SOUTHALL FC which is struggling to keep itself afloat. It has no sponsors and no money and hasn't won a match in nearly two decades!!! None of its players are professionals but a bunch of full-time dads, butcher shop owner, garage owners etc. It is completely made up of expatriate Indians, Pakistanis and Bangladeshis. Adding to their woes is a greedy commentator cum businessman, played by Dilip Tahil, who wants to grab the ground of the football club to build a shopping mall and theme park. To sum it up the club is in dire straits and the only way of survival is to win their League Championship and get the prize of 3 Million Pounds!!! Really a tough ask for Southall FC.

Thus the story revolves around the resurrection of the football club through a former player of its-played by Boman Irani. This time he takes the mantle of the coach after living in wilderness for 22 years!! Arshad Warsi and John Abraham are the key players of the club around which the team revolves.Bipasha plays the team's doctor.

The main problem with this movie, in my opinion, is that it tries to pack a lot in those reels and that stretches it rather close to 3 hours. That wasn't required. The basic premises is right but the execution isn't. Some sequences are good-like the one that involves Boman Irani trying to convince John Abraham to play for Southall FC. The final match is another sequence that stays with you. I am not too convinced with the racism angle involving John Abraham. And especially, in today's time when an iconic club of England-Arsenal doesn't have one English player in its starting line-up!!! The picturisation is good. The locales of England are something that we bollywood fans have grown use to. But the sequence involving the home ground of Manchester United will please a lot of serious soccer fans! All the performances in the movie are good. John's soccer skills are very very fine! Arshad Warsi and Boman Irani are good too. Bipasha is just there-nothing spectacular on her part! Overall 6/10. Not Too exciting!!