As always, please click one of the stars at the end of this post to rate the movie!

Where the fock have I been! What happened to my effing commitment to publish movie reviews and just what the heck do I think I am!

What else eh my bona fide, beloved reader ;)!? Yes I have been away for a real long time but trust me it was not by choice. I have been so utterly busy with my new job that it was nigh impossible for me to find out time for anything else at all. But I do apologize for this disappearance and without further ado let us get on to the review for this week.

Describe the movie in one word: Imoteph-Ownes-Dragon-King-Any-Day

Vital Stats;

Title: The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor

Director: Some real lonely dude…

Nahh..*grin*

Director: Rob Cohen

Starring: Psychos and some real ugly babes

True

LOL! Seriously

Starring: Brendan Fraser, Jet Li, Maria Bello, Michelle Yeoh, Isabella Long, Luke Ford, John Hannah

Runtime: 112 minutes

Plot: Nothing new or innovative really. Alex (Luke Ford) is Rick O’ Connell (Brendan)’s son who is really messed up by the tall shadow cast by his father. Portrayed as a bit of a rebel (a real ugly one by the way) he ends up digging an ancient Chinese Emperor (Jet Li). Now this emperor dude (Han) was cursed by a witch back in his time and was frozen in time along with his army of 10,000 strong terracotta warriors (is it just me or do these guys sound something that is made up of 60% cotton and 40% polyester or something?). Trailing Alex’s find is a rogue Chinese Army general who manages to break the curse on the emperor and bring him to life. The reason – this general wants “order” bestowed on this rogue chaotic world. Well this is it. Now it is upto the O’ Connell’s along with a mysterious Chinese girl who can summon the abominable snowmen etc to stop this mad emperor from resurrecting his army of cotton warriors and taking over the world.

My Psychobabble: I MISS RACHEL WEISZ! I am sorry to say but Brendan Fraser had no chemistry with his onscreen better half Maria Bello who was just awful. Accepted that every individual has his/her own special personality traits and while some have excellent looks (aka yours truly ;)) while some have exceptional talents (ahem!) but then there are people like Mario Bello who are truly exceptional (in the sense that they have neither!). Her portrayal of the character was week and left much desired. Somehow even Brendan Fraser looked quiet uncomfortable playing this part which he played amazingly in the first two movies. Luke Ford seriously could be Maria Bello’s real son for he had all the qualities of his on screen mother viz. nothing! He acted bad, looked bad and worst – had the longest role really.

Michelle Yeoh – oh well wont go into details on her as this would invariably lead to spoilers. But suffice this to say that Michelle Yeoh, Jet Li and John (Jonathan) are truly wasted in the movie.

Other than bad acting and badder (don’t you dare frown over my seemingly incorrect English) looking actors the movie has too many week points. The script is poor and does little to hold one’s interest during the length of the movie. The direction is week and the characters are poorly written. I don’t even want to start pointing mistakes made in the movie as many sites already have this information. However special effects of the movie are commendable. They are better than the first two indeed.

Verdict: If you liked the mummy series then watch this simply for the reason that this is unfortunately one of them. This is like the ugly duckling of the family but then alas! It is family.

Watched this over the last weekend and trust me as much as I wanted to do this review as soon as I was out the cinema I have had one helluva crazy week at my job. Had no bandwidth whatsoever to be able to do anything other than my blasted work! Every day I spend at this job, everyday my belief in Oscar Wilde’s saying (Refer: http://achingpen.blogspot.com/2008/04/slave.html) strengthens.

Anyhows holding myself firmly in check lest I should shoot of on a completely different tangent moaning about a job I so very much wanted, worked hard to get and eventually got but now barely month in which I feel stuck and which makes me wonder everyday why I wanted this in the first place after all, I shall get back to the business in hand (no I don’t mean my beer just in case you know me and were beginning to wonder which come to think of it why would you even if you know me, its not like I am an alcoholic and if you do know me then you would also know that I haven’t drunk any alcohol for a month and not smoked a single smoke in more than that time as well so there is no point really in my mentioning about my beer is it? Oh darn! I shot off another tangent, mayday mayday, someone keep me in check!) and would start with the review of this movie titled – Tashan!

So let’s begin then by summarizing the movie in one word – Tashan!

LOL! I can be so bloody predictable! LOL! No seriously as clichéd as that sounded up there the movie is all about Tashan. Now if you have no ties with India and are scratching your head and those online dictionaries trying to figure out what this word “Tashan” means, here is a small introduction

Tashan: It’s a kind of a vague reference to extreme style. The style could be related to anything, clothes, bling, cars, planes, sex, movies, mercury, venus, earth, mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto, moon, Angelina the yumm Jolie, Jennifer Anniston, my beer, your beer, his beer, her vodka martini………any bloody thing. This word is like the famous “F” word. Use this to justify a temporary or even permanent (like tattoo) proof of insanity or extreme styling. If you are still scratching your head (and maybe trying to pull out your eye balls by now wondering why you read me) imagine this – you get max drunk out in Vegas and get a Mohawk. Then you decide to paint it in vivid shades of red and pink. You wake up next day and your mate asks – dude what the F*** that is! You can easily reply back saying – Tashan dude its my Tashan and everything would be cool.

Wit this small lecture out of the way for the uninitiated, lets get back to the movie! (I hate those tangents, grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr).

The vital stats of the movie are as follows

Title: Tashan

Director: Vijay Krishna

Starring: Akshay Kumar, Saif Ali Khan, Kareena Kapoor, Anil Kapoor.

Length: 160 minutes

The Plot: The movie is all about larger than life characters each with his/her unique demeanour or mannerism or way of operating or style or (yup you got it right) – Tashan. The story revolved around 4 main characters Jimmy Cliff, Bachchan Pande, Pooja and Bhaiyyaji. Call centre executive Jimmy Cliff (Saif Ali Khan), gangster Bachchan Pande (Akshay Kumar) and Pooja (Kareena Kapoor), a girl who can't be trusted take a dangerous journey across India.which will alter the course of their lives in more ways than one. In addition to that, there is the evil eye of Bhaiyyaji (Anil Kapoor), a maverick gangster who enjoys killing people as much as he enjoys speaking English which is one of the biggest Tashans of this movie but at times does get very irritating, seriously.

My insane blabber (duh!): Akshay Kumar and Anil Kapoor rock! They are two of the most versatile actors in commercial main stream Bollywood. They are like Vodka, awesome on its own but those who like to mellow things down can take it and mix it with any damn thing else and they would bring out the best of the mix. The movie overall is enjoyable provided you buy two tickets again, one for you and one for your brain (even I can’t believe I am using the same joke again, trust me) because you wont need it. In fact don’t try to use it much else you would only end up spoiling the fun. The movie does a good job of keeping you entertained. Anil Kapoor has played his part marvellously however his English does become tiring after one point. The director should have seriously cut back on it. I mean even vodka if taken in beyond a certain limit can leave you nauseated and hung over! A noticeably slimmer Akshay Kumar has truly lived his part. He has very easily blended into his character of that typical bhaiyya from Kanpur. Saif and Kareena are their usual bunch with Kareena a bit disappointing. Action scenes in the movie are seriously stupid and are totally unbelievable but then hey! There is nothing in the world that can not be justified by saying ‘Tashan!” (oh no! not that you damn pervert! Jeez! I am talking about psychologically normal things here you moron!). The climax is seriously trash and overly long. In fact I would say that the climax is probably the worst part of the entire movie. I was quiet disappointed by the way it ended but hey you cant have everything in life right unless you are the Ambanis or Bill Gates or Steve Jacobs or Tatas or Birlas or Murthys or Clintons (oh fock, this is turning depressing now) or Bushes (LOL! included him just for the heck of it really).

Saif, Akshay and Kareen in Tashan

Verdict: So do go and watch this movie but don’t go with high expectations. Be prepared for asome irritating scenes involving both Akshay Kumar and Anil Kapoor and be completely prepared to not analyze any scene involving gun shots or else you would be seriously disappointed. If you go with a positive mind set trust me you would seriously end up enjoying the show! When all hell (and a very stupid and idiotic hell) breaks lose at the end, don’t stand up to leave. Remember you have paid the admission price (which is exorbitant these days by the way) and have gone through the entire movie now. No point leaving when it is almost over!

Oh boy this one is gonna get me into so much trouble and that too a helluva different kinds of troubles. Lets list them out

Plot: Emma Loyd (Uma Thurman) is a radio agony aunt who dispersive advise over radio waves faster than a vending machine anywhere in this world. During one such calls she takes over the radio she ends up breaking the future wedding of Patrick (Jeffery Dean Morgan) and his sweetheart. Incidentally Patrick was tuned in with a bunch of mates to the radio station when Loyd was dishing out her advise and hears the whole thing. Desperately trying to make Loyd realize the evil of her acts he ropes in a friend who lives on the floor beneath his (by the way did I mention that Patrick lives on a floor that is above an Indian Restaurant called “The Samosa Palace”?) and who is computer nerd. This friend hacks into NYC state records and marries Emma Loyd to Patrick!
Now the thing is that Ema Loyd is about to get married to our serious, immaculately perfect to the letter British boy Richard(Colin Firth). When Richard and Ema go to the city house to get their records done, they find out about this marriage between Ema and Patrick! Ema must now trace this “mysterious accidental husband” by the name of Patrick and get this weeding annulled so she can marry Richard. And then we all know what happens, they meet, they each have an agenda but they start falling for each other and so on.....


My psychobabble:

Title: VANTAGE POINT
Cast: Dennis Quaid, William Hurt, Matthew Fox, Forest Whitaker, Eduardo Noriega, Edgar Ramirez, Said Taghmaoui, Ayelet Zurer, Sigourney Weaver
Director: Pete Travis
Screenplay: Barry L. Levy
Cinematography: Amir Mokri
Music: Atli Övarsson
Length: 90min
Oh and if you are wondering…yup I did catch them back to back. Like buy a ticket, pop in, watch the movie, pop out, buy another ticket, pop in again!!

Right so as I do let us begin by summarizing the movie in one word then shall we – WellSeeItIfYouMustButThenNothingToShoutAbout.

I know I know what you are thinking, that is not one word now is it? But then let me ask you this, do you really care as long as you get what I am trying to say? :P
I must say though that the concept behind the movie is very interesting. I don’t think I have come across many such movies that try to do something different (and NO I will not consider Cloverfield here). I will describe the plot in a nutshell and then discuss what is unique with this movie

Plot: The movie revolves around the central plot of assassination of US president (William Hurt) while he is attending a landmark summit in Spain which hopes to bring an end to terrorrism. Thousands of spectators occupy the plaza where this event is happening and but of course there are hoards of media people with their cameras and recording instruments.
As soon as the US president takes the podium and begins his speech two shots are fired from somewhere which hit the president straight on in his chest.

William Hurt as President Ashton

While the world and the security services are still trying to scurry away Mr. President for medical attention and are trying to control the resulting pandemonium we have a few blasts that take out the entire stage and the surroundings. Caught in this action along with our Mr. President is Thomas Barnes(Dennis Quaid) one of the Secret Service agents who has only recently been reinstated after taking a bullet for Mr. President an year earlier. He is initially portrayed as a man fighting desperately to hold onto his sanity, someone who is constantly living the nightmare of being shot and who is trying harder with every passing moment to elude the tentacles of the horrors of the past that creeps on behind his back when he is not looking and that which tries to pull him back into the dark abyss of nothingness dissolving his will to fight to live and even to survive.

Darn! I keep forgetting I am doing a movie review and not writing a literary piece here. And I also forget that most of you who are interested in my insane babble knows the place where to find the deluges of it – http://achingpen.blogspot.com. Pardon moi!

Dennis Quad as Thomas Barnes

So back to the review then, this as I described above is the basic plot. Here comes the interesting part
Interesting Part: This movie doesn’t flow from a beginning in time to an end in time in a linear fashion.

Confused?

So am I.

Wait lets try again. In this movie the events though happen one after the other as in any normal movie, they are not displayed or shown on the screen in the chronological order of their happening in the movie. To elaborate, this movie takes into account various central characters and show the events as they note those events in the movie (and hence the title The Vantage Point). The movie keeps rewinding to 11:59:57 a.m. where the entire series of events start. This rewinding of the movie to this particular time while is essential for the theme of the movie, it is a tiring exercise for the audience who have to see a few key events at least (like the gun shots, bombing etc) every time the movie rewinds. However since with every rewind the viewers see the events from a different person’s involvement and interaction with the situation depending on this location in the movie. There are always new happenings depending on where that person was during the course of the events and each replay fills in some pieces of the puzzle. But nonetheless the repetition of the few central events is enough to bore you at times.

There that makes more sense now, doesn’t it?

So while this movie tries to do something different in the terms of narrating a story from different point of views of the different characters involved in the sequence of events filling in some pieces of puzzle with every rewind (like who masterminds this assassination etc.), still towards the end there are more questions unanswered than the movie actually strives to answers. It is an interesting watch for sure purely because of its concept but I would suggest that you buy two tickets, one for yourself and the other for your brain as you can conveniently leave it on the seat next to yours. You won’t have to use it during the course of the movie anyways. If you do manage to use it I salute you and I hereby declare that whenever the Queen (yeah yeah God save the Queen, Jeez!) decides to bestow Knighthood on yours truly I shall promptly bang my chest and declare in my most formal voice that I truly believe that you are the more deserving one for this honour.

Verdict: If you have nothing better to do and if you are interested in exploring how such a narration of events can work from different points of view depnding on the interaction of various characters involved in the plot then definitely do go and watch this. The Vantage Point is a moderately paced movie and would keep you interested till the end. But be aware that the frequent rewinds would bore you at times. Not to forget that by the end there are some questions unanswered and movie almost ends abruptly. It’s a good timepass though (certainly much better than Cloverfield IMHO) and I would recommend you do catch this once but don’t have any high hopes.