Yaadein...

Subhash ghai attempts to make a love story which falls flat on its face. This is probably one of those movies which really test your perseverance..(of staying in the hall). I am yet to leave a movie in the middle but if there is one movie which could have broken my unblemished record, yaadein has to be it. The movie is a story of a father trying to become a dost of his three grown-up daughters who have been brought up in London. Now obviously, the father is Indian to the core and there are enough dialogues in the movie about sanskriti etc.

The father(played by Jackie shroff) wobbles between the two extreme views about mohabbat(whether it is good or bad) and there are a lot of sub-plots none of which is allowed to develop. The romance between Hrithik and kareena is pathetic with all the usual fundas thrown in(viz saving the heroine, puppy love etc). Hrithik may have a great following but (this is my personal opinion only)he has yet to show any subtelty in his acting. He tries very hard to show his love which translates to shouting and making faces (a.l.a shahrukh) instead of letting his eyes do the talking. There are twists:) like rich boy-poor girl, love is good/bad, another girl, a dead sweetheart always dressed in white, sacrifice to show gratitude etc which are just ghai's attempts to borrow from the breed of directors who are adept at making love-stories. Ovreall, a forgettable movie.

I was disappointed by this movie because of its heavy recycling of the same old plot with new speeches. From the trailers it looked like it would be a good movie, but like other reviewers at IMDB I feel that this movie was an utter disappointment. The only thing that might save the movie are the cinematography, songs and the music, and _maybe_ the acting of Hrithik Roshan and Kareena Kapoor. By the way, this review was sponsored by Coca Cola (sorry, I just couldn't resist ;-) )

Though I am not a Hrithik fan, I went to see the movie because of Subhash Ghai. After all he has given some excellent movies to Indian Film Industry. And I had a lot of expectation from this movie too. But unfortunately I'll have to say this was one of the worst movies I saw in recent times. Right from the first scene it seemed like a drowning ship. Throughout the movie audience kept on expecting that now the ship will get itself floating. But with every minute it kept on going down. Audience were laughing in serious moments of the movie. But it seemed like it was trying to save itself (specially during song sequences, dance by Hrithik is only little good thing about the movie). After two hours of movie the movie ship is already drowned. And then it seems the whole crew gives a last attempt of salvage, without understanding that its already underwater. In last half an hour of the movie Jackie has given a credible performance. But at the end it was the biggest disappointment of the year. Sorry to the Hrithik fans.

Yaadein - Something you would remember for all the wrong reasons. The actors behave like mannequins than people with flesh and blood, the delivery is staccato, and the plot is stilted. Of course H. Roshan's acting and dancing is good as always, but unfortunately it is not enough of a saving grace to sit down and be tortured for 3+ hours.

The movie can be described as one big advertising arena - for products ranging from Coke to Hero bicycles. If you are part of the unlucky lot that have bought a ticket to be entertained, make a game of counting the number of products that are being plugged in the various scenes. You are likely to derive more satisfaction than from the storyline.

Let's look at why I feel that "Yaadein" is a nice, entertaining movie (and justifies a score much higher than the 4.5/10 awarded to it:

1. The songs are really terrific.

2. Everyone has acted quite well when compared to the acting levels that one generally sees in Hindi cinema.

3. The story is credible.

4. The director is very well known.

So why has this movie got such a low score?

My personal belief is that Hindi movies get wild, inconsistent ratings from fans who have not thought the matter sufficiently through. How else can one justify a rating of 9.2/10 for "Dil Chahta Hai" and just 6.0/10 for "Asoka"? Is "Dil Chahta Hai" a better movie than, say, "Shawshank Redemption" which was rated 9.0/10?

"Dil Chata Hai" is good. But 9.2/10? I don't think so. And does "Asoka" deserve the low rating of 6.0/10? I don't think so.

It appears that very few people rate Hindi movies compared to the numbers of reviews that English movies get (45 people rated "Yaadein"; 75,837 people rates "Shawshank Redemption"). This causes distortion in the average especially when the "swing" (as seen in the case of "Yaddein") is so large.

I belive that "Yaadein" should be rated 6.0/10. It's a nice entertaining movie and not the sinking ship that it has been likened to.

See it and decide for yourself.