Bajrangi Bhaijaan

After seven years of Mehreen Jabbar's Pakistani film titled RAMCHAND PAKISTANI (2008), revolving around an 8 year old kid and his father unintentionally crossing the border into Indian Territory, we now have our own BAJRANGI BHAIJAAN made on a similar kind of subject having an adorable kid girl from Pakistan lost in India, to be rescued by arguably the most popular Khan icon in India, Salman Khan.

As a preview article written a day before the release, I mentioned five potential USP's of BAJRANGI BHAIJAAN other than its plot or Salman Khan as: 1. The Director – Kabir Khan 2. Harshali Malhotra (the cute little girl) 3. Journey to Pakistan (reminding you of Tara Singh of 'Gadar: Ek Prem Katha') 4. Nawazuddin Siddiqui (repeating his solid support as seen in 'Kick') 5. And above all Lord Hanuman (as the divine saviour helping in the heartfelt task invisibly)

Luckily as speculated, BAJRANGI BHAIJAAN intelligently exploits the above five points only as its major strength and delivers a largely entertaining film with a decent first and an electrifying second half ending on an exaggerated yet emotionally charged note leaving a positive impact on the viewers. And all this, without any typical item number, specially focused love affair, romantic songs or overdose of action quite surprisingly.

To give you the details how the above mentioned USPs are well incorporated in the film, it begins with the first 10-12 minutes completely focusing on the adorable little girl, who straight away wins your heart with her innocent looks, smile and effortless expressions.

With Salman Khan being introduced as a true Bajrang Bali devotee, the 'selfie song' raises the spirits superbly. And then the film keeps progressing till the next hour as a simple but sweetly executed social family drama with all clean entertainment focusing on the cute little girl and differently innocent, immensely likable Salman Khan that was missing in all his recent blockbusters since WANTED. So the only minus to be mentioned in the first half remains a couple of average songs, particularly the 'Chicken' track that surely could have been edited out to keep the pace going. Post interval, where the film offers much more entertainment though its various sequence in Pakistan, you lost the count of creative liberties taken right from the border crossing sequence to the 'larger-than-life' climax, portrayed with all good intentions. Nawazuddin once again makes his much awaited entry with a bang, enacting a lifted sequence from a real life viral-video of a Pakistani reporter (having a similar name). Nawazuddin simply takes over from here till the end, winning hearts with his fabulous act of a kind human helping Salman and the kid girl without any hidden motives.

If watched with a realistic mindset, the film does have many 'impossible situations' depicting the relationship between the neighboring countries and the way Pakistan's police/military deals with the sensitive issue of catching a spy. But after few minutes of enjoying all the pleasant insertions post interval, one begins to think that 'to hell with whether this is possible or not, lets enjoy the proceedings on screen with the trio (Salman-the Girl & Nawazuddin).

As a director Kabir Khan brilliantly rediscovers himself from being an experimental director of KABUL EXPRESS to an entertaining commercial film-maker following the Raj Kumar Hirani school of thought, wherein everyone in the script has a golden heart. He extracts an extremely lovable performance from the charming Harshali Malhotra and also thankfully presents Salman Khan as the same old, big hearted, honest, childlike person hugely loved by one and all for their various reasons. In other words Salman actually acts this time with an author backed role performed well, answering all questions raised upon his recent performances strongly. On the other hand, Harshali is a real delight to watch with all perfect emotions and her scenes together with Salman remain the highlight of the film throughout, right till the last frame.

So here we have a film that can easily be called as the best among Salman Khan starrers in the last decade with an equally important message for the 'not so friendly' nations along with many well- written & brightly enacted supporting acts coming from Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Om Puri, Sharat Saxena, Rajesh Sharma and more. However as far as the leading heroine of the film is concerned, Kareena Kapoor needs to be applauded for accepting this kind of (unimportant) miniscule role and making the best of her limited scenes given like a true professional.

Beautifully shot capturing the breathtaking locations of Kashmir, BB has an impressive background score by Julius Packiam and enjoyable dialogues written by Kabir Khan & Kausan Munir together, that stay away from any standard jingoism or clichéd preaching. Also as a surprising fact, the film's story has been written by V. Vijayendra Prasad, the story writer of BAHUBALI, setting Indian box office on fire since the last Friday.

Among the downers, we have its lackluster music unexpectedly composed by Pritam returning from a long break. In fact even the hugely famous qawaali originally sung by Sabri Brothers doesn't turn out to be that impressive in Adnan Sami's voice who is known to sing in much lower scales.

In all, BAJRANGI BHAIJAAN is a thoroughly entertaining film with its five USPs intact along with a clear message for the people of both India and Pakistan. Yes, it becomes too filmy with huge cinematic liberties taken in its border crossing sequences and the epic climax that is simply not possible in the actual scenario. But at times, such films seriously make you wish that may all the cinematic liberties taken on the screen somehow become true and we learn to forget our ugly past for the benefits of the generations to come at the earliest.

This is one of the best movies showing that there is no need to have any blood relationship when it comes to love. This movie also portrays when in love faults are not seen.

Spirituality always tries to preach to unconditional love is the only solution for happiness. This movie is a social movie showing such love between people who do not share anything common instead their belief systems, customs are quite opposite.

This is a latest example of how people get united and support the human values. News Reporters, Police, Army, public every one believes in a man who talks unbelievable truth but due to his honesty is shown via his face.

Salman Khan lived his character along with the kiddo. Fantastic acting by all actors.

Salman Khan plays Pawan, a devotee of Lord Hanuman. He finds a lost little girl (Harshaali Malhotra) who is mute. It is eventually revealed that she is Pakistani, and Pawan must risk his life and freedom to travel there and return her to her home.

Khan plays his gentle character perfectly, but Malhotra--even silent-- steals the show. Both actors relate well to each other, and their camaraderie feels genuine. The plot is touching, serious, and heartwarming. Overall, it's a fantastic movie.

I went to see BB on the day of release with my wife and 17 year old son. I'm not Indian or Pakistani, but white British, so it was fun sat in a cinema full of Pakistanis, to watch a film that could have painted Pakistani in a negative light.

Judging by the murmuring I could her there did seem to be some people during the interval that were not too impressed with the film - slow, boring, blah, blah - but by the end I think everyone left happy.

From a white British guys perspective I thought it was a terrific film, and so did my wife and son. Great story, interesting characters, a ridiculously cute kid who stole the show without saying very much, excellent music, and some scenery that took your breath away.

I thought Salman Kahn was great, much more three dimensional than I was expecting. Kareena Kapoor provided a massive dose of eye-candy and played her part well too, although it would have been nice for that part to have been developed more.

But for me the star of the show - other than Harshaali Malthotra, the little girl - was definitely Nawazuddin Siddiqui. He is one of the most mesmerising actors I've ever seen. He could read the label of a sauce bottle and have everyone transfixed.

In typical Bollywood style the first half was your typical setting-the-scene, which I thought was done very well, and it kept me interested throughout, but after the interval, as soon as Nawazuddin Siddiqui made his appearance, the film took off and didn't let-up until the end.

All-in-all a thoroughly enjoyable film for all the family.

Despite being a Salman fan I was not too impressed with some of his recent flicks which in my humble opinion lacked freshness or had mindless direction, so when a family member bought tickets for this movie I didn't go in with high expectations. But to you dear reader I'll say GO WITH HIGH EXPECTATIONS! It will not disappoint!

And more importantly go with your heart - that is all you need for this 2.5 hours long film to become one of the best you've seen in years. It's just one of those movies with such heart-tugging moments and the highlight - the bond between Pawan (Salman) and Shahida (Harshali) - which is such a delight to see that you forget all about plot, logic, direction - not to say that the movie lacks that. The perfection in execution is definitely there, especially in the second-half. I watched it in the AVX theatre with at least 500 others and from the sound of it at least 75% of them regardless of age or gender were crying from the intermission onwards - sometimes because it was sad and other times because the screenplay was just so pure and unfiltered that it just made these happy tears bubble up inside of you.

There is a certain level of comedy throughout and definitely some deep witty one-liners. My favourite was from Nawazuddin Sidduiqi (who played his role to perfection) who pointing at the current state of the media and their polarization of India and Pakistan proclaimed that "Hatred sells. Mohabbat doesn't."

The movie has depth, a message, and the cuteness overload that is Harshali Malhotra. It also has a relationship and emotions so simple yet so extraordinary that they make a hero out of a common man. :)