Don

This film isn't the greatest to ever hit bollywood, nor it is a path breaking film for the industry. Don is a genuine entertainer with an interesting storyline for the 70s era. They could have spent half the film showing the notorious don but instead the character dies soon, and later is replaced by a look-a-like. Which is where we get plenty of laughter and light moments. Towards the end when he is discovered by the police to be a fake Don, he is in a big soup. It is interesting how he manages to prove himself innocent, and how he find the father of the kids he was taking care of. Easily said, Hindi films are generally made up of lots of coincidences and this film is no exception. This is one movie where the female lead is not just used to provide sexual and love interest but Zeenat Aman gets plenty of footage with her martial arts and action scenes. The remake of Don by Farhan Akhtar in 2006 is bound to collect some brickbats, but I believe his movie will be a high-tech thriller compared to the old retro version.

Don is a true classic thriller of the 1970s, and it surpasses the usual fare of the times in both story and execution. The film is extremely well shot, and Chandra Barot's direction is very good. The film gave me Bond vibes as I was watching it - everything about it from very early in the film is really stylish, the camera work is great, the sets, decorations, costumes, score, sound - everything boasts of very high production values. What makes the magic in the end is the script, which is tense and twisted and really well etched out, and, guess what else, oh, well, who else if not Mr. Amitabh Bachchan, who is excellent in his dual roles, and his presence alone does much to captivate the viewers. What almost takes away from the magic is the ending, which turns the film into a sort of slapstick comedy, unintentionally I guess, but it is forgivable because most films of the genre end on similar notes. The film has many other great things going for it, including great music, a lovely leading lady in Zeenat Aman, and impressive turns from the famous character actors Pran and Iftekhar. There's hardly a dull moment in this film. It's nostalgic and highly entertaining.

Don is a very bad boy. In an international syndicate of smugglers, Don is the meanest of them all. Mess with Don and you're dead. It's not just difficult to catch the Don... it's impossible!

Amitabh Bachchan plays Don like every cool dude rolled into one - Shaft, Dirty Harry, and err... other cool dudes! That is until he takes a bullet 30 minutes into the movie and dies. "Wait a minute - this movie is 3 hours long, and they've killed the title character already!" is bound to be your first thought at this. But it's alright, because the only man to see him die, the police 'DSP', happens to know of a man who is Don's exact double... and he has a plan. He trains up the amiable betel-nut chewing street performer in the ways of the Don, and sends him undercover to root out evidence against the rest of the gang. Here Amitabh gets to show his range - from badass cool dude to goofball to goofball pretending to be a badass cool dude, he fits the role (and those flared trousers) to a tee.

Don has clearly been made from concentrated 1970's extract... and it's cheesier than a McDonald's Cheeseburger where they forgot to give you everything but the cheese - and when you go up to the counter to complain, they just give you more cheese . But even though you know it's probably going to make you fat and give you spots, you can't help going back for more. The movie manages to straddle that fine line between inspiration and idiocy where you find the rarest of substances - pure entertainment.

This is not a movie to be taken seriously, and it could hardly be called a movie of great technical virtue. But Amitabh Bachchan takes the role(s) and gives them such a lot of character and life you can't help but love watching him. The crew of flared and paisleyed crooks and goons and the kung fu fighting revenge babe, the crippled tight rope walker and the well meaning but mostly simple police officers all make the Don's world an interesting environment to watch Amitabh at work and play too.

And then there's the zoom lenses, the toe tapping funk tunes, the chase scenes that seem to leap miles between each cut, the fight scenes that are acted out in courteous slow motion (when they're not being bounced around on trampolines)... the song and dance routine opining on the virtues of mixing opiates and stimulants... With Tears Of The Black Tiger and Don all in one weekend I feel guilty, like I've just eaten a whole triple chocolate cake in one sitting... life just shouldn't be this much fun!

If you've got 3 hours going spare, let the Don into your life too and he'll make you a happy chappy - I guarantee it!

"Don" is a film about a mobster called the Don (Amitabh Bachchan). He's a cold and dangerous man and specializes in blowing up his enemies. And, the guy is also very slippery and the police keep missing him. However, eventually, DSP D'Silva manages to kill the Don--but he has the guy buried in secret. Neither the police nor the criminals realize the Don is dead because D'Silva knows someone who looks exactly like the Don* and plans on substituting him. So, he creates a plausible story--that the Don was hurt so badly that his memory is temporarily impaired. However, Vijay doesn't realize that his impersonating the Don has two major problems--a woman in the mob is planning on killing the Don and what would happen if D'Silva was killed and they couldn't prove that Vijay WASN'T the Don! Tune in to see what's next.

The story is interesting and worth seeing up until the end. Unfortunately, the end is terrible--and almost slapstick. Seeing the disabled guy fighting so ably was silly as was the use of slide-whistles whenever folks did flips--and they did MORE flips than you'd see in the Summer Olympics! Badly choreographed and silly--it makes the film slip from a 9 to a 7.

This movie is one of the earliest blockbusters of the 1970s that firmly launched Amitabh Bachchan in the superstar orbit.

In an oft-repeated cop-robber plot, director Chandra Barot makes a film about a gangster don (no particular reference to any Mumbai underworld figure nor any sneaky take on a Hollywood film) who has eluded cops for a long time. "Don ko pakadna itna aasan nahin", says DCP D'Silva in an ominous tone that still resonates among the current duels between crime bosses and superstar cops like Daya Nayak.

The essence of Don's charisma goes beyond the methodical framing of its central characters in what is a rather straightforward plot. Cleverly written dialogs that inspired an entire generation of moviegoers, shots and scenes that (at the time) defied the boundaries of all conventional wisdom, fabulous acting by the main and supporting cast, and a musical score by Kalyanji Anandji that is evergreen to this day -- those are of course what made Don such a memorable movie in the minds of many.

Best thing is to go see it even if its your first or fifth time. Great movies such as this are way beyond Bollywood now, and it is doubtful if the current crap -- oops sorry, crop! of directors can ever concoct a compelling story such as this one.