Four Lions is a satire on Jihad and follows a group of men who claim to be Jihadi terrorists and are based in Sheffield England. In his directorial debut Chris Moris spins a tale of a group of five Muslims living in Sheffield England who after being radicalized by the society decide to join the Jihad and become suicide bombers.
The group is nothing more than a bunch of bumbling men who try very hard to train themselves into becoming suicide bombers. They fight amongst each other trying to control the group and end up creating hilarious situations. It might be seen as a controversial topic for a movie but the movie builds up well and is simply side splitting funny. The straight faced unintended guffaws makes the audience laugh out loud, like the scene where Faisal (Adeel Akhtar) tries to train crows to blow up targets.
Four Lions is a brilliant satire of a movie with some excellent acting from Faisal played by Adeel Akhtar, Omar played by Riz Ahmed and Waj played by Kayvan Novak. The Urdu expletives which Omar actually vomits at incredibly fast pace from time to time will have you ROFLing if you can get them. The story has a message but it is told in a very entertaining fashion.
Which Classic Movie To Watch Tonight: Man on Wire (Movie Review)
Genre(s): Documentary
Directed by: James Marsh
Starring: Philippe Petit
Running Time: 90 minutes, Color
On August 7th 1974, a young Frenchman named Philippe Petit stepped out on
a wire illegally rigged between New York's twin towers, then the world’s tallest buildings. After nearly an hour dancing on the wire, he was arrested, taken for psychological evaluation, and brought to jail before he was finally released. Following six and a half years of dreaming of the towers, Petit spent eight months in New York City planning the execution of the coup.
Aided by a team of friends and accomplices, Petit was faced with numerous extraordinary challenges: he had to find a way to bypass the WTC’s security; smuggle the heavy steel cable and rigging equipment into the towers; pass the wire between the two rooftops; anchor the wire and tension it to withstand the winds and the swaying of the buildings. The rigging was done by night in complete secrecy. At 7:15 AM, Philippe took his first step on the high wire 1,350 feet above the sidewalks of Manhattan…
James Marsh’s documentary brings Petit’s extraordinary adventure to life through the testimony of Philippe himself, and some of the co-conspirators who helped him create the unique and magnificent spectacle that became known as “the artistic crime of the century.” (Magnolia Pictures)
Which Classic Movie to Watch Tonight:Oye Lucky Lucky Oye (Movie Review)
Directer: Dibakar Banerjee Producer: Ronnie Screwvala Writer: Urmi Juvekar, Dibakar Banerjee Starring: Abhay Deol, Neetu Chandra, Paresh Rawal, Manu Rishi, Richa Chadda, Archana Puran Singh, Manjot Singh Music: Sneha Khanwalkar Genre: Dark Comedy, Drama
Oye Lucky Lucky Oye is a movie about a Superchor. He is as ordinary as any man on the road. He is as calm as a cow. And most importantly, he is a thief with a charm, with a style, with flair so natural that he seems heroic. He will steal everything and anything right under your nose and you would not know it. I would rather go on to say, that Lucky is no less than Bond. He is the guy with brilliant schemes; he is elusive to catch; he is always chased and he gets what he wants.
From the makers of khosla ka ghosla comes yet another engaging film. Dibakar Banerjee portrays a real story with such detail that the audience is forced to get absorbed. From the dialect, to the inter-personal relationships, to the situational misery and humour, it is all too easy to relate. The film keeps a strong Punjabi flavour intact. Manjot Singh, who plays young Lucky, contributes to the realism of the film which is rather too beautifully extended by Abhay Deol. The cast is refreshing. Manu Rishi plays Bangali, who immediately became one of my favourite characters in the film.
Oye Lucky Lucky Oye is a film for all. It doesn’t have a plot that is a masterpiece. But the execution and the entertainment are worth applauding. It’s a film very rich in its flavour. Don’t miss it!
Which Classic Movie to Watch Tonight: Manorama Six Feet Under (Movie Review)
If great theatre can be timeless -- the Bard is freshly recycled on stage or screen somewhere in the world every single week -- the same must hold true for great cinema.
Following the thought that a fantastic screenplay is open to as much reinterpretation as a play, debutant director Navdeep Singh takes the tribute route by basing his first film on Roman Polanski's 1974 classic, Chinatown.
Small-town Rajasthan is no Los Angeles, and Abhay Deol is no Jack Nicholson. And yet ManoramaSix Feet Under stands out as a dusty recreation of a superb film, crafted with earthy ingenuity.
For those who haven't seen Chinatown, this Hindi version is a strong, well-executed, tight thriller.
Deol's character, Satyaveer Singh, is built in distinct contrast to Nicholson's unforgettable JJ Gittes, a tough yet cultured and well-off investigator, while SV, when we first meet him, is a junior engineer just fired for having accepted a bribe. He's guilty -- the fee lies parked outside his house, on two modest wheels -- and a failed novelist.
His one attempt at a novel -- Manorama, the pulpiest of fiction with a lurid cover making the beautiful Hindi word 'upanyas' sound shameful -- sold just 200 copies. It is then that he sits and wonders what to do with his bitter, sarcastic wife (Gul Panag) and annoyingly energetic son when the door knocks and the femme fatale enters.
Only this isn't the stuff of Philip Marlowe. A soberly-clad Sarika breezes in and introduces herself as the Minister's wife, and says she needs SV to spy on her husband. Why me, the unemployed writer justifiably asks.
'Because in a town this small, we don't have private detectives. You're the closest we have,' she explains,' a writer who writes about detectives.'
And so it is that SV, tempted by unexpected adventure and a well-timed stack of banknotes, decides to go hide in the bushes and take a few pictures. As the noir genre demands, one thing twistily leads to another...
It's tremendously hard to discuss this film without constantly paralleling it with Chinatown. It's all there: the double-crossing, the false identity, the nose-break (though I wish Singh had himself jumped onto screen to slash it, just like Polanski's cameo) and the resultant bandage, the incest, the blackmail and surprisingly enough even the water issues, the original film being set around the California Water Wars.
Abhay is a candid, extremely credible actor. As is often with intelligent actors, he knows how to be natural without pushing for histrionics, and works the understated character perfectly.
Raima Sen is a strong actress, in an interesting role. Panag too is steadily finding her feet in the world of low-key cinema, played straight and fine. Vinay Pathak is solid as a liquor-friendly cop, but one laments his lack of screentime. Little needs to be said about Kulbhushan Kharbanda, the veteran still effortlessly able to toss an ice-cube at your spine.
The film is shot neatly -- goldfishes flit past eyes, nondescript checked-shirts blend into the sandy background -- with much grounded, rustic charm, and the pacing is good. The film, balanced on the edge of 'slow,' never quite loses the grip. And the end works.
Forget originality Jake, this isChinatown. This is a noir tribute where fans of the original will have seen it all before, yet sit through this freshly-developed retelling with a smirk on their faces, the kind of smirk that understands why a Chivas and soda could work with daal-baati churma.
Which Classic To Watch Tonight ~ Satya (Movie Review)
Directer: Ram Gopal Varma
Producer: Ram Gopal Varma, Bharat Shah
Writer:Anurag Kashyap, Saurabh Shukla
Starring: J.D Chakravarthy, Urmila Matondkar, Manoj Bajpai, Shefali Shah
Music Soundtrack: Vishal Bharadwaj
Background Score: Sandeep Chowta
Running Time: 171 min
Satya is a 1998 Hindi crime film directed by Ram Gopal Varma with a
screenplay by Anurag Kashyap and Saurabh Shukla. It stars J. D. Chakravarthy, Manoj Bajpai, Urmila Matondkar and Shefali Shah. The film tells the story of Satya, an immigrant who comes to Mumbai seeking his fortune but instead gets sucked into the Mumbai underworld.
Satya was released on 1998 July 3 and was also dubbed in Tamil and Telugu. Made on a shoestring budget of INR 2 crore (roughly $400,000), the film became a surprise hit at the box office, grossing INR 15.5 crore and becoming the 10th highest grossing Indian film of 1998. The film went on to win six Filmfare Awards, including the Filmfare Critics Award for Best Movie, and three Star Screen Awards.
The music for Satya was given by the young emerging music director Vishal Bhardwaj. Vishal had already won critical acclaim for his music of Maachis and expectations were high from him and he delivered in style.
All in all, India got the first glimpse of organized crime on the big screen with Satya.
Movie Gooroo Rating: * * * * 1/2 (4 and 1/2 stars)
Which Classic To Watch Tonight ~ Rock n Rolla (Movie Review)
Directer: Guy Ritchie
Producer: Steve Clark-Hall, Susan Downey, Guy Ritchie, Joel Silver
Writer: Guy Ritchie
Starring: Gerard Butler, Tom Wilkinson, Thandie Newton, Mark Strong, Idris Elba, Chris Bridges, Jeremy Piven, Toby Kebbell
Music: Steve Isles
Cinematography:David Higgs
Genre(s): Action | Crime
Running time:114 minutes
Language: English
RocknRolla is a 2008 British crime film written and directed by Guy Ritchie, and starring Gerard Butler, Thandie Newton, and Tom Wilkinson.
Guy Richie’s RocknRolla is a lot like the overpriced bag of M & M’s I consumed whilst in the cinema. On the outside, M & M’s are visually appealing; boasting a vast array of colours and an elegant little “m” imprinted on every piece to add a hint of class. The chocolates are marketed to suggest that each colour has a distinct character, be it witty Red or moronic Yellow, and the word “new” are plastered on the bag every time a different size or colour is introduced into the family. However, no matter what the colour or size, as soon as a handful of M & M’s pass beneath your vision and into your mouth, you are quickly reminded that they all taste exactly the same. The same goes for Richie’s latest British gangster flick. Once you look past the abundance of colourful characters and beyond Richie’s distinct visual style, you soon come to realise that you’re being fed M & M’s of a different kind – a Muddled & Monotonous film that fails to distinguish itself from Richie’s previous, far more accomplished, mob films of the 90’s.
Lenny Cole (Tom Wilkinson), a ruthless London mobster who claims to own half the city, forces two small time gang members, nicknamed One Two (Gerard Butler) and Mumbles (Idris Elba), into his debt through an elaborate Real Estate scam. At the same time, a Russian billionaire with the intent of building a new football stadium in London strikes a deal with Lenny, asking him to use his many connections to get instant approval for the project. However, the delivery of Lenny’s €7 million payment becomes the target of a small time gang – consisting of who else but One Two and his partner desperately seeking a way to pay off the money they owe.
As muddled as RocknRolla may be, one must commend Richie’s visual style. The heart pounding intro, consisting of a unique and rapid camera movements and a thumping soundtrack, would probably get the residents of a morgue excited. However, once the opening montage fades out and the dialogue heavy scenes take over, Richie’s film is anything but Rockn’…it’s actually quite a drag.
Aside from some genuinely witty scenes of dialogue, most of the film suffers greatly from sporadic pacing. With such a high-octane opening montage setting the scene for a film that exists within a genre noted for its mature content, there’s a bizarre absence of action and excitment in the RocknRolla. Blink and you’ll miss the films singular sex scene, which completely arrives out of left field as though it’s a part of a romantic sub-plot tacked on at the last minute. Even those strong willed individuals who do retain interest throughout the film, hoping that the many loose ends are tied off neatly, will no doubt be disappointed by the anti-climatic payoff that results.
Returning to the motif of this review, RocknRolla is a lot like a bag of M and M’s; visually interesting to begin with, but a bland and repetitive experience overall. It’s a true testament to the saying that style is nothing without substance. Despite some solid performances and unique cinematography, the film is plagued by poor pacing and an over abundance of characters and subplots. It’s certainly better than what Richie has offered up recently, but you’d be hard pressed to find anything that’s not.
Which Classic to Watch Tonight: The Doors (Movie Review)
Directer: Oliver Stone
Producer: Bill Graham, Sasha Harari, A. Kitman Ho
Writter: J. Randall Johnson, Oliver Stone
Starring: Val Kilmer, Meg Ryan, Kyle MacLachlan, Frank Whaley, Kevin Dillon, Kathleen Quinlan, Billy Idol, Josh Evans
Running time: 140 min.
The Doors is a 1991 biopic about the 1960s rock band of the same name which emphasizes the life of its lead singer, Jim Morrison. It was directed by Oliver Stone, and stars Val Kilmer as Morrison, Meg Ryan as Pamela Courson (Morrison's companion), Kyle MacLachlan as Ray Manzarek, Frank Whaley as Robby Krieger, Kevin Dillon as John Densmore and Kathleen Quinlan as Patricia Kennealy.
The film portrays Morrison as the larger-than-life icon of 1960s rock and roll, counterculture, and the drug-using free love hippie lifestyle. But the depiction goes beyond the iconic: his alcoholism, interest in the spiritual plane and hallucinogenic drugs as entheogens, and, particularly, his growing obsession with death are threads which weave in and out of the film. The film's tagline is: "The ultimate story of Drugs, Sex and Rock 'N' Roll."
"The Doors," like any Oliver Stone movie I've ever seen, is a big, too-long, unwieldy mess. But, all stylistic qualms aside, I enjoy it every time I watch it. It works not as a typical filmed story, but rather as sort of a hyped up documentary. In any event, it's got Michael Madsen in it--you gotta love that.
After wasting away my thirteenth year listening exclusively to Jim Morrison and friends, I approached this picture wearily--I am not typically fond of Oliver Stone, or Val Kilmer. I could not honestly imagine a more demonic pairing in my mind.
And everything I feared about the movie was true--Stone captures the manic energy of the Doors, but with way too much reverence. He's unable to see the Doors for what they were (cheesy rock band with some excellent songs); he obviously worships them as mythic rock Gods.
And, for the most part, his film is a true representative of their sound--all cock and bluster, with lots of flourishes thrown in to disguise the threadbare heart. But there's nothing wrong with that, because the narrative actually lives up to it's pretenses.
Stone sweeps the audience up, capturing the time perfectly. His movie has a free, meandering spirit, and the occasional flower-power overloads have their goofy charm (a trip to the desert is aesthetically pleasing, if not exactly respectable filmmaking).
And Val Kilmer IS Jim Morrison. The first time he begins to sing, it's almost painfully awkward--eyes closed, voice booming; it all reeks of faux white boy soul. But Kilmer has enough presence to overcome the essential cheesiness of portraying Morrison, and his quiet intensity is a joy to behold.
"The Doors" often wanders off into the wrong direction, but its energy is infectious and there's plenty of great music to keep us watching. The combination of these tunes and Stone's high minded approach form a cinematic mix that is at once enthralling and nauseating, kind of like two cars colliding.
He's crafted a winning valentine to one of the most celebrated bands of all time, and he's done so by celebrating the Dionysian excess instead of the music.
I think Jim Morrison would have appreciated the irony.
