kya_bakwaas

Ah well. This is definitely one of the better Bollywood attempts at Romantic Comedy. This film is essentially old wine in a new bottle - a very new bottle. Take a bit of "It happened One Night", toss it with a pinch of "Jetlag" and add parts of "French Kiss" for fluffiness. You get the idea. But the point here is that this heady mixture does seem to work! Aditya Kashyap (Shahid) is the scion of a grand business empire and has recently taken over as the head of the group after the death of his father. But currently work is the last thing on his mind as his girlfriend ditches him. In a very melancholy mood, Aditya just walks into a Delhi-bound train where he meets Geet (Kareena). Geet is a complete day-dreamer of a girl and is in high spirits as she plans to elope with her old boyfriend. Only she hasn't planned it out.

Aditya and Geet don't along well at all but as fate could have it they both miss the train at an nondescript station. Out of obligation, Aditya helps Geet to get to her parents' place, Bhatinda. But the story doesn't end there.

Geet wants to run off to Manali to her boyfriend before her folks marry her off to some old family friend. And for the lack of a better person, she drags Aditya into the mess as well. At the end of it, Aditya goes home completely inspired by Geet's optimism and the positive attitude and applies the same to mend his broken personal life and business.

Then there are some plot twists here and there. But the screenplay is excellent and engages the viewer. It is quite light hearted film and avoids clichéd or raunchy humour. The comedy and the relationship between the lead pair is handled superbly.

Kareena has never been among my favourites but she has always given some good performance and she doesn't disappoint this time either. However, I was quite pleasantly surprised at Shahid Kapoor's performance. He has underplayed his role in the first half beautifully. I was quite impressed really - I was hoping that this will turn out to be one of his SRK-aping ham marathons. Good work. And, if I use this overused term, the "chemistry" between the 2 Kapoors is brilliant. The cinematography doesn't let the film down either. Plus it has been mostly shot on location (Shimla, Manali, etc.) so it is refreshing to watch. The first half especially has all the shades of a road movie - a genre I love. Good script and spunky music adds to the effect. On the whole, nothing is out of note. Good movie.

This 1980 star-studded box office disaster is a real old favorite of mine. A very slick, very action-oriented movie with a non-standard theme that promised to change Bollywood movie-making standards of the early 80s (Ramesh Sippy's "Shaan" was another one in the same genre). Never mind why people spurned this movie when it was released - it was probably released in the wrong decade! In many ways, this was a landmark movie. It was one of the few movies made on the Railways. Quite surprising that Bollywood took so long to pay a fitting tribute to the Railways because (at least during those days) a humongous percentage of working Indian populace were directly or indirectly dependent on the railways for their livelihood. Why, the Indian Railways were one of the largest employers in those days! And the best part is the tribute doesn't go over the board. The Railways depiction is more or less realistic (note to critics: the song-and-dance parts before the Super Express is launched is just plain old Bollywood masala – nothing to do with the Railways).

The train has been the ubiquitous, yet highly sidelined prop in dozens of Bollywood movies. Who can forget the passenger train that brings the jailer to Ramgarh in "Sholay" or the endless shots of Victoria Terminus in any movie based in Bombay. Even now, trains have been very much around in the Bollywood landscape. "Bunty aur Babli" recently effectively used Indian Railways throughout the movie to enhance the small-town feel. The economy of many Indian towns (especially those in UP, where the Railways network is densest) is highly dependent on the Railways. The trains in India have been much more than just a mode of transport – they are a part of our very fabric.

Anyway, back to the movie – it about the launch of a new super fast express train that runs between Delhi and Bombay in a record time of 14 hours (clearly a tribute to the swanky Rajdhani Express trains that was the hottest thing on the tracks those days). The movie starts in Varanasi rail factory (Diesel Locomotive Works), where a group of capable engineers (Khanna, Dharam "paaji", Mehra, etc) toil away to design the new engine. After years of effort, their efforts finally pay off and the new express (er, aptly named "Super Express") is launched. However, engineers are humans too. During all this, the lead characters go through heartbreaks (Dharam-Hema), family crisis (Khanna-Babi) and professional showdowns (Danny-Khanna). Just when Khanna and co. are rejoicing over the success of the project, things go wrong.

The smitten Danny makes sure that he does what he can to ruin what would have been his pet project. To avenge his humiliation, he plants a bomb in the engine and renders the brakes useless. Meanwhile the train is full of standard stock characters – a kind-hearted petty thief (Jeetendra), a runaway bride (Singh), a school teacher (Simi Gerewal) with an army of school kids, a diamond smuggler (Ranjeet) who has an undercover cop (Sujit Kumar) chasing him, the heartbroken hero (Dharmendra) and his ex-flame (Hema) with her new doctor beau (Nischol) a pompous army man, the Hindu pandit sitting next to the staunch Muslim, the paan-chewing seductress in red sari (Asha Sachdev), the Sardarji, the Parsi, the Marwari – you name it! So the brakes have failed, the engine drivers are dead and the runaway train is speeding away on the tracks while the unsuspecting passengers have a ball singing qawwalis in the train. There is no way to contact them (remember – this was early 80s – no mobile phones – ah! Blissful days) Luckily, we have Dharamendra who jumps back into the train to save lives. Things go from bad to worse as the pantry catches fire and the fire spreads rapidly. Our heroes on the train take the onus to do something to save their own lives while the heroes outside are trying their best to get things out of the train's way! Trust me: stagecoach-sagas cannot get better than this.

As I mentioned, it was one of the slickest action movies of its time – use of miniatures, complex action sequences, chase scenes, explosions, aerial shots – it has a bit of everything. Excellent cinematography and a plausible screenplay add to the effect. The all-star cast is excellent, especially Khanna who delivers a powerful performance as the engineer trying to set things right. It is probably "inspired" by some Hollywood flick, but the thing is it has been very well done. The songs by R.D. Burman are excellent. I especially love the qawwali "Pal do pal ka saath hamara". "Vaada" and "Meri Nazar" are also quite good. This was a very, very good effort by Ravi Chopra (who later moved on to make movies like "Baghban" and now "Babul") and, once the express leaves Delhi station, is a non-stop action thriller. Pure Bollywood vintage action flick, very slickly made and served with loads of quintessential Bollywood masala.