Saas Bahu aur SENSEX takes a dive

Last evening I went to INOX in City Centre to watch a much talked about film, “Saas Bahu aur SENSEX” which turned out to be disappointing. The high point was before the movie at KFC; Two Tangy Zingers, French Fries and Coke made up for the visit to this side of town.

Though the name invokes images of warring mothers and daughter-in-laws and the effervescent graph of the stock markets, the movie is like the flat line of a cardiograph connected to a dead patient.


I sat through the movie expecting to laugh through it. I think I did for a brief three seconds and it was back to the same drab acting and storyline. Though Kiron Kher as Mrs. Binita Sen looks elegant, her effort to portray a Bengali lady falls short with a bit too much of “Shona” and the other “daak naams” ( pet names ) seem too forced. Of course that doesn’t take away from her ability to hold her ground as a superb actor. The other noteworthy character is that of Farouque Sheikh playing Mr. Firoz Setna, her stockbroker.

Masumeh and Tanushree are there for eye candy if at all anyone really thinks they are “HOT”? The other characters all just get waylaid by the weak script and direction of the movie. I really don’t know if it’s worth mentioning names such as Sharon Prabhakar and Lilette Dubey who also have substantial roles in the movie.

Phew! Thank God I bought all that Popcorn and Coke. It got me through this movie. Did I mention there were all of eight people in the hall?!

Build Up to The Weekend

Friday Night, I decided to visit my favourite haunt, Some Place Else. It had been a while since I went there. So after a great meal at One Step Up, where I was astonished by the service we got, we headed out to Some Place Else. The usual suspects, Hip Pocket, were there belting out favorites from the Beatles and other bands from yesteryear. We were a little taken aback by the lack of crowd, but by 11 pm the place was packed as usual. It was a pleasant evening listening to some of my favourite music after such a long hiatus.

Once back home, I was bewildered by the little lights illuminating our entire housing complex. Clearly Durga Puja is just around the corner.

You'll Fall off your seat with THE ZOHAN

In “You Don't Mess With the Zohan”, a comedy, Adam Sandler stars as Zohan, an Israeli commando who fakes his own death in order to pursue his dream; becoming a hairstylist in New York! His arch nemesis The Phantom is played by John Turturro and love interest Dalia is played by the petite Emmanuelle Chriqui.

Apart from his crazy adventures in New York of cutting hair at Dalia’s saloon, among other services he provides the old ladies queuing up for their dose of the Zohan, he is being chased by a crazy Palestinian taxi driver Salim, played by Rob Schneider.

His first friend in New York is Michael, played by Nick Swardson who takes him home only to be witness to The Zohan working his philanthropic art of pleasing women on his mother Gail, played by Lainie Kazan!

The movie is a riot and I can guarantee that you will fall off your seats watching this movie. I just can’t get over how people come up with such crazy ideas and execute them into major motion pictures to entertain people. Go watch it.

Lucky Number Slevin

The immensely handsome Josh Hartnett ( Slevin Kelevra ) plays the lead in this movie that revolves around his case of mistaken identity. This puts him plum in the middle of a gang war between to New York Mob Bosses who were friends once and now have turned foe. The two bosses Morgan Freeman ( The Boss ) leads one faction and Ben Kingsley ( The Rabbi ) the other. Bruce Willis ( Mr. Goodkat ) is the deadly assassin who is called in to do jobs that no one else will or can do. His trademark Kansas City Shuffle gets most of his marks. Lucy Liu ( Lindsey ) plays the coroner, pretty neighbour and Slevin’s love interest.

Others in the movie are Stanley Tucci ( Det. Brikowski ) the crooked New York Detective following Slevin and Michael Rubenfeld ( Yitzchok ), the Rabbi’s gay son.

The movie is full of twists and is quite gripping as the plot unfolds. “Lucky Number Slevin” is definitely worth watching.

Good Chinese Food

While the puja shopping frenzy is in full swing, I had visited Mani Square Mall, where the mall was in the thick of their Shopping Festival with preparations going on in full swing for the “Jal” concert this evening to attract Kolkatans to the Mall.

I had some work, post which a meal at “HAKA” was most welcome. A practical restaurant with the right price, quality and quantity, it is just perfect for a weekday working meal.

Romancing the weekend

Definitely, Maybe is a poignant story of love loss and confusion. Love is something most people spend a lifetime looking for and marriage is something that happens due to circumstances. The narrative takes us into the mind of a father who is trying to explain to his daughter the distraught life that he is leading. Getting divorce from the child’s mother and her inquisition to find out his reasons of his failure to find true love he discovers that he had love all along and just didn’t realise it.

The movie stars Ryan Reynolds (Will Hayes) and Abigail Breslin (Maya Hayes) as his daughter. You might remember her for her splendid performance in Little Miss Sunshine. Supported by Isla Fisher (April) as his love interest, Elizabeth Banks ( Emily) his wife, Rachel Weisz (Summer Hartley) the lovely journalist and one of his love interests and Derek Luke (Russel Mccormack) his best friend.

This 2006 release star the now superstar Sarah Jessica Parker (Paula) of the enormously popular Tv series and now a major motion picture Sex and the City fame and Matthew Mcconaughey (Tripp). The plot is simple. Paula is hired by Tripp’s parents to date him and basically get him to move out of the house. As the plot unfolds, the hunter becomes the hunted and the hunted becomes the hunter which is quite irrelevant because by the end of the movie both of them actually fall in love with each other. Quite a predictable plot with some funny moments and Matthew Mcconaughey’s display of a greatly athletic physique if that makes any of you girls happy. Zooey Deschanel (Kit) Paula’s eccentric room mate is worth a mention for her histrionics. Failure to Launch is definitely worth a miss.

Godfather Duo do it again

Every time the news of the two Hollywood greats doing a film together does the round, it makes movie goers anxious to see if they still have it as actors and better still whether they have the ability to do justice to complimenting each other on screen.

Righteous Kill stars Robert De Niro (Turk) and Al Pacino (Rooster) as NYPD detectives who are partners chasing a serial killer who they believe is a cop. The plot keeps you guessing in this whodunit. A good movie to watch.

VISHWAKARMA PUJA

Yesterday was Vishwakarma Puja and in this busy build up to the Durga Puja another splendid reason for people of Bengal to take the day off and not do any work to make merry. The worship of all the metallic tools is more an excuse for the consumption of great food and tons of "mishti". The good part is that there are miniature pandals all over town as a precursor to the Bigger Goodess setting foot into the city. Am already feeling "Puja-ish" if can use that term.

Computer Screen To Movie Screen

HITMAN is an action thriller that the movie makers created from the popular computer video game. A little unrealistic to have a group of assassins trained from childhood with shaved heads and bar-codes tattooed on the back of their heads and yet walk around openly crossing international borders without disguise to pop-off heads of states. All this with one Interpol agent tracking our “HITMAN” who he claims no one has ever seen and who never misses his mark.

Timothy Olyphant plays the cold blooded professional good guy assassin Agent 47. The only time he shows any kind of emotion is when he comes upon Nika played by the sexy model turned actress Olga Kuylenko. He does fall for her charms when she prances around naked in his room and tries to seduce him. Only that he knocks her out with a jab from his syringe of sleeping stuff. He is being chased around the globe by Interpol Agent Mike Whittier played by Dougray Scott.

The plot is a bit complicated yet by the end of this movie that’s quite irrelevant when you see all the action. And isn’t that what you want to watch in a film such as this. So don’t expect any Oscar winning performances. Just some well planned and executed action.

Art meets Multiplex! Does this formula Work?

I don’t really know what the objective of this film was; to entertain, or to showcase the film making capabilities of the eclectic film maker Rituparno Ghosh. It’s like an arty film trying to be sold to the mainstream cine-goers. Oh and for all those who have been praising the Big B. Well I don’t see what the difference is. He did black which was well received and if he thinks roles like that suit him, then he’s been typecast into the stereotype ailing super star of yesteryear's still clinging on to that status by any and all means possible. Yes agreed age does catch up with stars, but then still trying to compete in the multiplex age of dazzling daredevils like Akshay for a pie of tinsel town is just pushing it, don’t you think?

Though the likes of Bengals star Prosonjit and Jisshu accompanied by the handsome Arjun Rampal, still riding the Rock On! wave and Priety Zinta and Divya Dutt chipping in great performances, I was yawning halfway through the film. By the end of the movie I had completely lost the plot.

I would advise all those looking for entertainment to steer clear of this Iceberg else you want to sink in several hours of misery. Big B fans, go for it, since you’ll are blinded by your reverence for this great star. Critics, well here’s another one you’ll can take apart and either put Rituporno higher up on a pedestal or then just move the one you’ll had put him up on, so that he can come back down to the ground and make films to entertain.

ABBA Music Resurrected yet again

Mama Mia is a brilliant film. Well if you’re from the generation that grew up on Abba. I’d not recommend the movie unless you’ve actually first heard at least the best of Abba on your music system and that too several times. Well that advice is for all the teeny boppers.

Meryl Streep and Pierce Brosnan are just brilliant accompanied by Colin Firth who always brings that wry British humour to any movie he’s in.

The music of the movie is based on songs of the super group of yesteryears “Abba”. I remember about a decade ago there was this huge resurrection of the super group down under. I forget the movie that did it, but I’m glad that Hollywood is working to keep classic music alive. I remember just a short while ago watching a great movie base don the songs of The Beatles called “Across the Universe”.

I highly recommend this movie.

An OK movie but great Food Court

Though the movie had two big Hollywood stars Ashton Kutcher and Cameron Diaz, I didn’t quite think the move made the grade. The plot is pretty week except for some nice one liner and funny scenes. Else the movie can be given a miss.

The saving grace was the meal before the movie at South City Mall’s food court. We had some Chinese and topped it with Pastries for dessert. The food court is really good and value for money

Little Black Book

Brittany Murphy will capture your heart in this wickedly funny film about a really nice girl who's a disaster waiting to happen. Hired to work on a tabloid TV show, Stacy Holt's life gets turned upside down when she is persuaded to explore one of the show's themes, and snoops through her boyfriend's Palm Pilot. But she's forgetting one thing: in the world of daytime TV, there's always a shocking surprise in store -- and she's about to get a big one!

Cute Movie

This is one of the cutest movies ever. Wouldn't expect anything less from Walt Disney. Wall-E is such a sweetheart and though he's a robot. Add to that his love interest, EVE, the highly sophisticated and advanced robot and a bevy of other strange but cute robots and the film is a treat.

Party Spills over to Some Place Else

After Magnolia’s the few of us who were left headed across the road and indulged in some Rolls at Kathi Rolls. We were also witness to a fire being put out by Firemen of the West Bengal Fire Department.

After rolls Prabir, Pranab and myself headed to Some Place Else and I wanted to get them hooked up with another classmate of ours who plays there. When we got to Some Place Else and each of us got a pint of Kingfisher beer, I pointed out to the Shimmering Bald head on stage. The two of them couldn’t recognise him. I finally revealed his name and they went into shock. Samidh Mukherjee on bass and vocals for Hip Pocket was one of our batch mates. Of course a far cry from what he looked like in school. After the band had finished playing we met up with him and reminisced some more about the good old school days.

SJC94 get together at Magnolias

I was looking forward to this Get together for a long time. Finally the meeting was a blast. For most of the part before getting there, I was just wondering to myself, it would be most embarrassing if I couldn't recognise the boys. The last time I had seen them was in 1994. Fortunately I was banking on Debdeep being there since I had bumped into him several times when my office was next door to his and we'd end up meeting when we were out for a smoke, tea and “shingara”.

Rajarshi, too I was sure I'd recognise, as I inherited his work folders as he was part of the team that had initiated the Radio Project for ABP. Of course with that I also inherited a whole lot of other interesting stuff. Shows how "hard" he was working on the project. The rest were just faint memories.

But the moment I arrived at Magnolia’s and went up to the first floor, it was great to instantly recognise Nizar, who I had been speaking with on and off but never managed to meet. Dhurjati was also easy to recognise. The others took a bit of time, but then the faces started falling into place. Prabir was one of the familiar faces. Arijit who has turned out to grow to "three times" the boy he was in school and I mean literally, took the longest.

The best part about the entire evening was that though we guys and I mean most of us, were meeting after years, one thing that remained is the basic intrinsic people we were back then had not changed. Size, shapes and careers might be diverse, but we're all still the same people we were back in school.

Shopping In Gariahat

Man I've actually come to this market after ages. The streets side shopping, though chaotic can get you some decent bargains.