Delhi Safari

I was taken aback. While watching India's first stereoscopic 3D movie with such a beautiful message, I was entertained, mesmerized & marveled at the creation.

The story is simple, yet unrealistic, about a group of animals who set out to the Parliament to speak out their grievances. The grievance is that they are being murdered, chased away from their natural habitats. It is so in parallel with the need of the hour in India & the whole world. It talks about the plight of animals and why animals are going extinct. An eye-opener for some, Delhi Safari is truly remarkable in its style, narration and innovation.

Yes, like I said it IS little unrealistic, but who cares when it gives a valid message. The voices provided by our Bollywood celebrities are very good, the dialogs make you laugh and the direction is also good. I was little disappointed with the editing but the soundtrack made my day. A complete entertainment package, this!

BOTTOM LINE: A wonderful must-watch in the wake of boring mainstream Bollywood movies. 100% Recommended. Both for adults (the message) & kids (animation).

Language: Mediocre | Sex & Nudity: No | Violence: Critical | Gore: No | Smoking, Alcohol or Drugs: No

Graphics - Not up to the mark. No comparisons with Hollywood movies as the animation is below par. Nevertheless, pretty good leap for Indian animation industry.

Performances - Outright hilarious, mind blowing and awe inspiring. The way Govinda infuses life into the monkey is unbelievable. He is the best of the lot with all the funny dialogs of the movie. Akshay Khanna is simply fabulous, especially in the climax scene. Another voice over to look forward to is that of Prem Chopra, who shall leave you with your mouths wide open.

Overall verdict - One could see this movie thrice in three consecutive days. The dialogs will make your day and there is very high probability that you fall in love with the Bihari hooligan accent and imitate it for days to come.

Hats off to director Mr. Nikhil Advani, who choose a tough path of making a meaningful film rather than following the common path of making a commercial cinema. Making an animation and meaningful film is complete risk in Bollywood but he took the challenge and proved himself right. This film is sweetly entertaining. Camera angle used in story telling keeps the pace of film on very good note. Animation is done creatively. Especially the bee animation is mind blowing. Most of the voice dubbing is done by known bollywood actors but Govinda's voice is superb. Wow, you can't stop smiling to hear him. He is brilliant. Rest Akshay Khanna, Boman Irani, Urmila Matondkar and Saurav Shukla are also fine but Govinda is outstanding. Story, screenplay is very good. Dialogues are fantastic. Great work by writers team Mr. Nikhil Advani, Girish Dhamija, Suresh Nair and Milap Zaveri. They have even touched a very sensitive issue of Tiger saving in a scene, which was heart touching. 3D impact is not up to mark but when subject and narration touch your emotions, you don't bother about other things. Music score by Shankar Ehsan Loy is very good. You would feel that you are simply watching a typical Bollywood movie. Even animated choreography justifies it. Overall, it has all ingredients of a good film, drama, emotion and entertainment. Please go and watch with your lovely kids. They will enjoy as well as you.

what can i say about it? meh. it wasn't great but it wasn't atrocious either. it was just... okay. the story's about a group of animals whose home (the jungle) gets destroyed by humans with bulldozers to make way for a some-kinda resort or a hotel. so the animals set on a journey to the big city to ask the humans why are they destroying the jungle. and when i heard of that, i was like "this sounds really generic". and it was generic, but i can't deny that it did have its great moments. and some of the characters were likable and relevant so there's that. but honestly, even though i did enjoy it, "Delhi Safari" still wasn't that good. the story's nothing new, we seen it done over and over again. and it really plays on that by-the-numbers scenario in which it gets annoying. well for most of the time, it does. and even though i did admit there were likable characters, most of them felt just really bland, so you don't really care about them that much. watching "Delhi Safari", i was pretty much like "i seen better characters than these before". like in "Alpha and Omega", where the movie kept me smiling and happy, it doesn't play by-the-numbers, it had better animation, a great message and i loved every character in it. here, it's not the same thing. "Delhi Safari" obviously has weaker animation than "Alpha and Omega" (and "Alpha and Omega" was co-produced in India too, despite being almost entirely American). like the movements seemed rough, the characters designs weren't that great and the backgrounds were a big meh. and it wasn't really funny either. i mean, it had jokes that did made chuckle (there's only 2 jokes in the whole movie that made me laugh), but chuckle alone isn't enough to make your movie funny. so, with that being said: "Delhi Safari" did have good moments in it, it did have some good/relevant characters, the voice acting was good and some of the animation and cinematography looked nice and pretty, but honestly that's not enough. most of the time, the animation was stiff, the other characters were bland and forced, it was pretty predictable, the we've- seen-it-before story plays by-the-numbers which gets annoying and there wasn't much of a climax here, cause once you think it's gonna get better by the end... no, it just ends like that, abruptly. that really kinda ruined the movie. i did enjoy it and i respect the fact that India actually tried to give us something at least enjoyable (they did), but they should've worked on this movie even more.

5/10

Nostalgia contributes more to this review than the actual ratings. This movie was one of the first Indian animation movies I watched, and it has left a deep impact on me. It's animation doesn't hold up, it's message is overused and it's filled with fart and poop jokes - but its a good movie all the same. It's filled with songs that contribute messages, and it's finale is something to remember. I would say it doesn't deserve a 9 star, but its a good movie all the same.