Mohabbatein

Mohabattein was the first Hindi movie I ever saw. It was sent to me by a friend who is crazy for Shahrukh Khan.

My first impressions were, `WOW, this Shahrukh guy has a tremendous screen presence (but, yikes, what a profile!)' and `I love the old guy with the black hair and the white beard. He's too cool.' As for the movie itself, I wondered how in god's name anybody could enjoy that horrid cat-in-heat screeching which issued forth whenever that gorgeous young woman (Aishwarya Rai) opened her mouth to sing. And I found the interminable love stories of the three young couples to be boring, boring, boring. I spent all my time waiting for Mr. Aryan and Mr. Shankar to come back onscreen.

As for the story, I was completely out of sympathy for the silly idea that it's more important to spend your college years running around trees and going to dance parties with scantily clad girls than to be studying or going to prayer. As a westerner who has watched my own treasured Catholic traditions thrown overboard one by one for every goofy, modern idea that comes down the pike (clown Masses, anyone?) I was firmly on the side of Mr. Shankar: `I don't like change, Mr. Aryan!'

I've since learned that Amitabh Bachchan is like the Sean Connery of Indian cinema, and that Shahrukh Khan is known better for his manic, over-the-top performances than the quiet, mature act I saw in Mohabattein. (I cringe whenever he is referred to as `The Tom Cruise of India'…Tom Cruise can only wish he had Shahrukh's talent and screen presence. Sharhukh definitely would win that contest by a nose.)

But to be honest, I didn't like this movie much, and after seeing about 50 Hindi films since then, I still don't like it much. It has some great songs that are almost completely destroyed by the ancient, crackling voice of Lata Mangreshkar (sorry if I spelled it wrong), and I still can't sit through the endless love stories of the three young couples. ONE couple would have been plenty to get the point across, and it would have cut the movie by 45 minutes or so, which it badly needs.

As a person who grew up on the MGM musicals of the 40s and 50s, I have eagerly embraced Bollywood (but no kissing). And although I get bored pretty easily with the dancing around trees (it all starts to look the same), I just can't get enough of those Holi celebrations! Bring ‘em on.

Okay, this film stars Bachchan and Khan in a film showing a sort of clash between the two over practically nothing. The two do really well. Khan is very, very good in this energetic but relatively subtle performance, and Bachchan is imperious and towering in his pride. The two work very well together. But besides that, you have a story which is not very convincing and worse, most of it centers on the young stars and starlets and their college romances, with Khan given the task of matching them all up together. Instead of focusing on the ideological differences between Khan and Bachchan, Aditya Chopra makes them the background through a great portion of the film, turning what could have been a good drama into something that resembles a very cliched and boring high-school romance. This entire track lacks credibility. Other than Khan and Bachchan, the film has a beautiful Aishwarya Rai in a short appearance, and it is very memorable today for its magic track "Humko Hamise Churalo", sung to perfection by the divine Lata Mangeshkar, who was, hold on to your seats, over 70 years old when singing it. Unbelievable. It's a pity the film doesn't live up to this level, and just ends up being really overlong, and for no justifiable reason.

Mohabbatein is the second directorial of aditya chopra after ddlj. Narayan Shankar (Big b) is a strict authoritarian running a school named gurukul with three rules- parampara,prateestha, anushasan. Meaning only focus on studies. Enters into the school raj aryan(srk), as a violin teacher who focuses on everyone to love. This irks narayan shankar and later it is revealed that raj was a former student of gurukul thrown out by shankar for loving his daughter meghna(aishwarya rai) who committed suicide after that. Raj has entered here to take revenge on shankar by turning his disciplinary school with love and romance. The story also focuses on 3 students of gurukul- Vicky (uday chopra), sameer(jugal hansraj) and karan(Jimmy shergill). Vicky falls in love with the neighboring school student ishika(shamita shetty), sameer is in love with his childhood friend sanjana(kim sharma) and karan falls in love with a young widow kiran(preethi jhangiani). Rest of the movie is how raj helps these boys and whether he could defeat narayan shankar or not. Highlight of this film is the faceoff of two big superstars itself. After several failures as a lead actor in 90s, bachchan decided to shed all his superstar image and become into a character actor through this film. Mohabbatein started a new phase for big b as what we see him today. SRK's raj is overly romantic. Both of their combination scenes are handled well. Among the three love stories, my favorite one is karan and kiran's only. Vicky and ishika one is childish and sameer sanjana one is meh. Today, none of the female lead actress could shine in Bollywood and in males only Jimmy is today a successful actor. There is also one side track of anupam kher and archana puran singh as the cliché sardar which is forgettable. Songs look good on screen. Production values of yrf are grand. But the movie is too long and far too unrealistic. On the whole, mohabbatein can be enjoyed if you ignore its unrealistic plot and if you are a big fan of these superstars.

Some love stories live forever.... And so will this movie...Two great superstars offers superb acting......Seeing two talented actors like Amitabh Bachchan and Shahrukh work side by side was mind blowing...The story reminds us that love is all powerful and with it we can overcome the most difficult of situations...Gurlz were ok...The soundtrack is amazing...Violin Music was melodious...Locations were mind blowing....skimpy clothes were good...watchable movie.

I have seen some good movies in my life but this one totally caught me off guard. I have never seen any character, in movies or real life that believes in love and the power of love as strongly as Raj Aryan does. Raj Aryan's character is everything that is good about mankind. Ironically it was a quirk of fate that made him the way he is, but nevertheless his character is most amiable. Amitabh's character is just perfect for him, something he is very comfortable playing. With the changing times, he had turned from the `Angry Young Man' to the `Angry Old Man' - he plays it wonderfully. One can actually feel his pain and sympathise with his character. The three love stories are the only loose ends of the movie but without them the overall movie would not have been able to take shape. If you believe in the inherent goodness of mankind then this movie is for you. It teaches us no matter what we do, love finds a way. But the real reason you should see this movie is because it's a real entertainer.