Umro Ayyar - A New Beginning

Leisurely experience for me with a matinee at a huge cineplex with five other viewers. I'm sure I'd give it half this score if I'd seen The Matrix. For a Pakistani film, it held my interest quite well. As I was debating a bathroom run, the film helpfully announced a ten minute intermission, complete with a countdown clock on screen. More films should do this. Anything over two hours, given today's attention spans.

Amar (Usman Mukhtar) is an interesting character, a genius professor who also sees apparitions and is the last in a long line of UAs. It's cool to see him branch off into reluctant superhero mode. Guru (Manzar Sehbai) is like a Pakistani Morpheus or Yoda. This gentle and wise sould had a pretty cool vibe that I bought. I kept thinking there may be a romantic subplot with Amar and his fetching daughter, but that never came to pass. The modern portion of the film was like a free travel pass to an obscure country. Half the dialogue was conveniently English. It was nice not having to read subtitles for the entire time. The time was well spent, even though I had no idea what I was about to watch.

The smallest summary I can give for this movie is: "Marvel's Dr. Strange meets Assassin's Creed Brotherhood", though I don't know how many would get the reference.

Pros:

• Nice CGI.

• Good action scenes.

• Decent acting by all, especially Guru, Laqqa & Hamza.

• Good storyline.

• No stupid dance scenes or tedious romance triangles.

Cons:

• CGI, though good, can be improved, like allowing the demon to close his mouth.

• Too many talkative boring bits which can be trimmed.

• Majority of the humorous bits were horribly misplaced. This was my biggest concern. A serious scene completely ruined by a stupid joke!

Overall, a good movie suitable for the whole family.

A must watch.

Pakistan's first attempt at making a superhero movie based on Tilism-e-Hoshruba an Urdu recension of a persian classic the Hamzanama.

In comparison to the best of Marvel or DC I would have rated the movie 5 which is pretty good for a first try. I went for a 7 because of the same reason and the fact that great effort has been observed from the part of the producers and all other people involved in the film and not to even mention the beautiful CGIs. Never thought we would get to see something of this quality in Pakistani cinema but here we are. One step at a time.

It should be emphasised that much more could have been done to make the movie better. Especially in the story writing, story telling and direction department. Characters were unnecessarily expressive at times especially when it came to being angry. Too many borrowed Clichy's, we need more novel ideas than were in this film. Also there was too much English being spoken, should definitely minus that part in the sequel, It is embarrassing how instead of keeping things traditional and culturally relevant there were unnecessary and cringy attempts to westernize things. Aim your things at the regular people and they will come. Instead of bikes could have used a flying carpet. Instead of English could have used Persian, it would have made more sense. Costume design seemed too middle eastern and Mediterranean at times with little basis in south Asian culture and tradition. Usman Mukhtar's character in his fathers suit looked like some ancient roman warrior without the helmets.

Acting by Usman Mukhtar, Hamza Ali Abbasi and Farhan Tahir was the best from the lot but still requires more attention. It was over done at times and underwhelming in places. Also I think, Hamza Ali Abassi's character should be more involved in the sequel if any. He did well. His character seemed much more interesting than Usman Mukhtars.

Nevertheless I would recommend everyone to go and watch this movie, its quite entertaining and unique in the sense that you will never see a movie that is about a superhero but also contains jinns, Ifrits and demons and is rooted in cultural traditional beliefs of the people of that land. Its our duty to help the producers recover the amount put into making this film with aesthetically pleasing visual and CGI also to ensure that they can come back stronger the next time with a larger budget and significant improvements hopefully.

Had been hearing a lot of buzz about this movie, so I decided to check it out. And let me tell you, it exceeded my expectations! The visual effects were stunning, the cast was perfectly chosen, and the story was captivating. The first half did a great job of setting up the plot, with detailed character development that felt just right. Initially, the narrative seemed a bit disjointed, but it soon became clear that this was necessary to build the story's depth.

One standout character was Ayyar Safeer, who started off with a tough exterior but gradually revealed a more endearing side, adding a delightful twist to the film. A shocking plot twist left everyone in the theater gasping. While there were a few minor flaws, the incredible VFX more than compensated for them. The movie wrapped up on a high note, hinting at an exciting sequel. Kudos to the creators for delivering such an entertaining experience!

From the perspective of the Pakistani movie industry, it's a decent effort, but the film suffers from weak story and character development, tedious dialogues, and lackluster acting. The actors fail to do justice to their roles, making it hard to connect with the characters or the plot. It's worth watching once, though I hoped it would compare to Maula Jutt, but it fell short of those expectations. The pacing drags in many parts, with long, boring conversations that do not add much to the narrative.

Despite these flaws, the movie shows potential, and it's clear that the industry is making strides in the right direction. The visual and technical aspects are commendable and hint at what could be achieved with better scripts and performances. On the bright side, I enjoyed the Deadpool trailer and definitely plan to watch that. Hopefully, future projects will learn from these shortcomings and deliver more compelling content. It's a step forward, but there's still a long way to go for the Pakistani film industry to reach its full potential.