nikhilfilmcritic

Director Abhinav Kashyap puts Salman Khan in Rajnikant's shoes in action sequences while the film's setting in U.P gives it a grand scope to explore the bhojpuri realm and take advantage of it for entertainment through dialogs and characters. Although the plot is dead simple, it still has enough juice in it to keep its momentum going with action, romance, comedy and Salman's screen presence. There is something about Salman's performance here that may not necessarily be charismatic but it engages you enough to make you whistle even in a multiplex (although this is totally a G7 or Chandan movie). This is Sunny Deol on drugs and Rajnikant revamped for Bollywood. Dabangg is different from 'Wanted' yet similar in Salman's prowess against adversaries.

The music by Sajid-Wajid-Lalit is hummable with Tere Mast Mast and full of masti with Munni Badnaam and Humka Peeni hai. Reminiscent of 'Omkara's title song is Hud Hud Dabangg with excellent cinematography. Salman in all these songs is a charmer and looks to be enjoying the filming completely. There is no choreography. Just some drinks on- the- house.

As the unstoppable Macho-man, Salman Khan excels in action sequences. He is, of course known to be stiff and it becomes very apparent while he is dancing but it is fun to watch no doubt, when he lets loose in most songs and just goes wild. Delivering bhojpuri dialogs, threats and romanticism, Salman Khan earns your whistling and hooting. Wanted and Dabangg both would've been catastrophic flops if it weren't for Salman re-inventing himself. Here, he doesn't look like he is out to prove that point. Most of the time, you can see him simply enjoying himself. Arbaaz Khan is passable but could've been sillier to add to the fun as Makhi. Om Puri, Vinod Khanna and Anupam Kher in cameos were superlative while Mahesh Manjrekar delivered a shockingly good performance as a drunkard father. Sonu Sood has been better in 'Jodha Akbar' but he is quite adequate as Chulbul Pandey's adversary. Newcomer Sonakshi Sinha looks beautiful, can put up a straight face pretty well and can compete well against her contemporaries.

It goes without saying that Dabangg was never going to be an intellectual enricher. This is pure, flawed entertainment and that is how it needs to be enjoyed. The action seems like a spoof of our southern counterparts and therefore, is fun to watch. Dialogues, however rude at times: 'haraamzade se yaad aaya, aapke sasur kaise hai?' are thoroughly laugh worthy and the sensational cinematography around Salman's entry at various points in the film augments his heroism. Considering these factors, Dabangg offers tremendous value for money and is no surprise that it opened to such an overwhelming response. Nevertheless, this is not going to be a revolution in Bollywood but just a passing tide and it better remain that way.

Too many movies have been shown where the old ones in US adhere to Indian traditions more ritualistically than those in India and the young ones conveniently go between being the ultra modern (whatever that means!) and ultra traditional as the script demands. They also have the poor girl married off and going to India (Some traditional family from India will ask for her hand) which doesn't make much sense because it seems to defeat the very purpose of uprooting the entire family from India. Kal Ho Naa Ho takes every one of these supposedly serious stuff (including Karan Johar's own DDLJ) and pokes fun at them. The uppity Naina (Priety), the confused Rohit (Saif), the serious grandmother and I must make bold to say, the ultimate do-gooder Aman (none other than Shah Rukh) - everyone of them is a caricature. And they have done these roles before. It is hard to take them very seriously because you get the feeling that the director and the writer are chuckling behind the cameras even as they are filming these scenes.

And then there is the pretty funny, long comedy track of a mistaken homosexual relationship between Saif and Shah Rukh. That "O ... Kantabhen" just puts it way over the top. I laughed like crazy. Is there an inside joke there Karan and Nikhil?

I don't know if I should say the casting is perfect or the performance is perfect for the parody. Every time I think nobody can ever act more theatrical than Shah Rukh, he out does himself. His performances are so unnatural and stilted that they are actually funny. With all the parodying going on, I am wondering if Karan and Nikhil decided to milk Shah Rukh for all he is worth and make him ham it up even more! Saif Ali Khan acts brilliantly in his repeat performance of Dil Chahta Hai and so does Priety Zinta of a number of her own roles.

Then, the writer-director duo decide to take things seriously and the problem is I still can't stop laughing. That makes it uneasy. They take every dramatic scene, blow it out of proportion - as is the convention of Bollywood standards - and keep showing it long after it has exhausted all its dramatic potential. This makes the second half of the movie a bit uneasy to watch. Particularly when Shah Rukh leaves the hospital to go convince Saif and Priety, I was very uneasy. Then they show Saif Ali Khan in that I'm-20-years-older-so-I-need-gray-hairs wig that is just too much!

Overall, it was an interesting movie. Somehow I feel that the filmmakers had more fun making it than we have watching it. Makes me wish I was involved in the process! 7 out of 10.

Harold and Kumar are trying to find an all-night White Castle after experiencing the sudden yearning that afflicts almost anyone who has had a 'slider' burger. Like that little square of fat and calories, the pot and girls are just too good not to indulge now and then. The two early twenties students, one a serious stock analyst and the other a lazy pre- med genius, are like Hope and Crosby in their witty repartee and canny ability to escape harm. Being delivered from the wrath of seriously deformed 'Freak Show' and his siren wife doesn't deter them from considering the affections of the battling babes or idolizing Neil Patrick Harris in a cameo playing himself as a lethal womanizer.

More serious is the multicultural subtext about stereotyping (Asians are nerdy number crunchers and Indians are overachieving medical doctors, for instance) overturned by, for instance, morphing a seemingly 'Joy Luck' club gathering into a raunchy party or exposing a gang of mouthy skinheads as 'girliemen.' It's all pop-cult fun at our own expense, something akin to actually enjoying the articles in 'Playboy' even if they weren't our reason for buying the mags.

My grandson Cody and I bonded once again, this time just laughing at the silliness, enjoying the satire, and figuring how we could get his dad to allow his young brother to see it, despite the lurid spots that give spice and lend naughtiness to our increasingly dangerous lives.