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Monday, May 02, 2011

Lock, Stock and Hera Pheri?


Sometimes I feel like grabbing some of the Bollywood people by the collar and giving them a good beating. I am not usually a violent man, but they do try my good nature.

This latest rant is the result of just having watched "Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels". I realized that I might have liked the film if I hadn't already watched it before. in Hindi, as Phir Hera Pheri. Director Neeraj Vora (who has also taken credit as Writer, ha!) has lifted the plot right out of LS&2SM shamelessly and just added slapstick comedy to make it funny. Deplorable, despicable, dreadful!

Had it not been for having watched Phir Hera Pheri I think "Lock, Stock.." is a good film, quite professionally made, though it might not be my cup of tea. I like action films, but I don't usually like British style of comedy.

More reviews later. Proper reviews, not rants. 

4 comments:

Always Happy said...

I AM NOT AT ALL SURPRISED...i am not referring to your 'otherwise' good nature but I am referring to the theme of your post! Bollywood needs directors and script writers with some original ideas.

Sunil Goswami said...

Ah, what you say is absolutely true, but I don't think there's a shortage of good writers in India, there is so much talent in India you can make movies for a 100 more years and not run out of stuff. Even if you just tap the classics from Sharat Chandra, Shakankar and Nimayi Bhattacharya, you could make a dozen movies with real stories. And that's just the tip of the Bangla literature. Then there's Urdu literature, Shaukat Thanvi's novels can be made into great romcom's. Then add to it the Hindi literature, Premchand being just one of the giants who have written numerous short stories and novels, then English stories written by Indian authors like V. S. Narayan, author of the famous Malgudi Days...the list goes on and on.

But who wants it? It's all about making a quick buck these days. When K. Asif made Mughal-e-azam it took 9 years and $2 million in the days when a film could be made for $20,000. Today, directors finish a film in 30 days. When would they have the time to think anything original?

I actually made a comment on Sagar's blog on this same topic detailing the process that current Bollywood movies follow. You can find it here, if you are curious -
http://sagargoswami007.blogspot.com/2011/03/jo-dikhta-hai-woh-bikta-hai.html

Always Happy said...

I see. OK. just to correct you, Malgudi days was written by R.K. Narayan.

Sunil Goswami said...

LOL. Sorry, I did mean R.K. Narayan. You see, I have hunted his books so many times in libraries and his books always used to be next to V.S. Naipaul. If I got to V.S. Naipaul that meant I had looked at all of Narayan's books. Even though I never read anything by Naipaul, I still mixed him up with R.K. Narayan's name because of that old library image. :)

And thank you for setting the record straight.