Man of Steel Blu Ray

Man of Steel had a tough tightrope to walk. It had to beat the candyfloss nature of 80’s and 90’s blockbuster cinema, and transcend the overload of the modern dark gritty origin story and the humanization of the superhero. The only solution to this problem was by pairing Nolan and Snyder, and when the film hit theaters it worked on some insane level, because Nolan excels at constructing superheroes by stripping away their morality and immortality, and Snyder is the master of deconstructing the superhero genre.

The new Superman story needed to lose its red underwear without becoming an all too serious and depressing guilt ridden drama. It did get polarizing reviews with in my honets opinion it was pretty much the best possible Superman movie you could get in this day and age.

Six months after its theatrical release the film arrives on DVD and Blu Ray with some interesting goodies. Whatever you say about the wanton destruction found in the final act, you cannot fault the film’s imagery and its brought out to glorious detail in 1080p. The handheld camerawork really shines on Blu Ray and the fight sequences become much more vivid and clear in the transfer. The post converted 3D nearly killed the movie but it’s really a pleasure to watch the movie in gorgeous 2D on your TV. The colours, textures and audio are absolutely top notch, giving you as close a cinema experience as possible.

The extra features include a segment that runs for half an hour and delves into how the movie tried to put a new spin on the myth of the Superman – it’s fun for those who liked the film and there’s even Michael Shannon in on the footage. One other segment features the stuff that went into the creation of the action in the film. That part is a bit of a mixed bag because it gives you details on the stunts and not so much on the incredible CGI shown in the film. There is actually a five minute long segment called Krypton Decoded and another one called Planet Krypton that wafts over the work that went into the prologue. Those not interested in the CGI can check out the animated short that commemorates Superman’s 75^th year. The most interesting featurette is a commentary on the second disc that runs about three hours and takes you behind the scenes of the production, sadly without giving you any info on the 2015 Superman-Batman film.

Movie Review: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

It’s December again and it’s time to return to Middle earth. A full year has passed since the disappointment of An Unexpected Journey, and Peter Jackson offers a mixed bag yet again. The good news – The Desolation of Smaug is much better and more exciting than the first Hobbit film. The bad news – it still is a lacklustre and hollow movie compared to the original Lord of the Rings trilogy.

The biggest criticism of the first Hobbit movie was that it took too long to get going. It seems like Peter Jackson listened to this complaint and fixed the problem this time around. The Desolation of Smaug gets into action in less than five minutes and it is thankfully briskly paced. The action scenes, despite resembling cut scenes from video games are fun as well - one featuring the dwarves floating downstream in barrels is beautifully choreographed. Moreover, while the first movie was just an adventure comedy for kids, the second chapter is more of a horror movie. There are dark forests, bottomless chasms, spiders, werewolves, Necromancers, disgusting Orcs and much more cool scary stuff to keep things interesting.

Best of all, the dragon Smaug is absolutely terrific; a landmark in computer graphics and Benedict Cumberbatch’s sneering booming voice gives you the goosebumps. If the LOTR films were memorable for Gollum, the Hobbit movies will be remembered for Smaug. When Smaug brushes off the gold coins covering him and stands up showing his entire form occupying the entire screen, it really makes your jaw drop. The tete-a-tete between Bilbo and Smaug when they meet for the first time is as exhilarating as the riddle chat between Bilbo and Gollum from the first movie. You need to wait for two whole hours before Smaug shows up but he really is worth it.

There are plenty of problems. Yet again Jackson crams in too many subplots about underdeveloped characters. When I watched Fellowship of the Ring I came out knowing the names of every character that appeared in the film. I’ve watched two Hobbit movies and I still don’t exactly know how many Hobbits or dwarves are there in the team, and I can’t name more than two of them. One of the dwarves gets a totally unnecessary and half assed love story, and there’s a lot of cringe inducing schmaltz that just pops in and out in during the tense sequences. The film is repetitive and an hour too long. The mid segment featuring the ‘humans’ is dull and boring - it totally destroys the fun of the mayhem in the first hour, and the wait for Smaug to make his entry becomes tedious. Legolas makes a return in a ham fisted Bollywood style love triangle. The final scene is a tad infuriating because just when there’s an epic buildup and you expect an epic showdown with Smaug, the screen cuts to black, telling you to come back next year.

None of those problems matter because The Desolation of Smaug is going to make a lot of money anyway. Every self-respecting fan of Tolkein, Jackson and Middle Earth is going to show up in theaters to watch this film and the next one. It’s time to accept the fact that Jackson sacrificed quality for an extra billion dollars in box office and just enjoy the computer generated awesomeness of Smaug on a big screen, in 2D. 

(First published in MiD Day)

Movie Review: Oldboy

Before I talk about the quality of the movie, I need to tell you something hilarious about the Oldboy remake.

If you’ve seen the Korean original (if you’re reading this, I’m sure you have) you’ll know that the entire film hinges towards that one sex scene. The shock value that the scene exudes during the final reveal was one of the primary things that made Park Chan Wook’s 2003 movie so famous. The film releases in India without the sex scene because it was axed by the censor board. There are no blurs, no edits, just a big old chop – it’s completely removed and the sex is not even implied. It’s amusing, and sad. And it’s not surprising, given the regressive attitude of our censor board. And it’s a shame that the distributors didn’t submit the film to the revision committee, because if they had the scene would’ve most probably remained intact.

That said, Spike Lee’s Oldboy is yet another gratingly unnecessary, clumsily realized Hollywood remake of a foreign classic. The film pretty much takes a giant dump on everything that we loved about the original film. There was a lot of fuss made about how this version was going to be closer to the Manga than the Korean film, but sadly that was all a big fib. The writing is credited to Mark Protosevich but the film doesn’t even try to do anything new with the material. Even some of the shots are exactly the same and you’re left wondering why Spike Lee is channeling his inner Sanjay Gupta. The film is in fact much closer to Zinda than it is to Oldboy. The former had excised the big twist to suit the faint hearted desi audiences, the latter trims down a couple of plot points to dumb it down extensively. As a result the remake is a hot mess that is neither for those who loved Park Chan Wook’s movie, nor for those unfamiliar with it.

Everything about the film is half-assed, from the writing to the direction to the acting by Josh Brolin. The one take hammer fight is reduced to a cringe inducing terribly choreographed schlokfest that makes the one in Zinda look better in comparison. Before being imprisoned Brolin’s character is supposed to be pudgy, but Brolin is clearly very muscular and he makes a hilariously bad attempt to hide his abs by jutting out his stomach to make it look like a paunch. Elizabeth Olsen’s character in the original hung out with the hero because someone else was controlling her actions. In the remake, the girl simply hangs out with a random stranger because she feels compelled to. The villain in the original was a classy badass with a terrifying motive to torture the hero, in the remake he’s given a scar on his torso to compensate for his cheesy standard issue back story. The whole thing really feels like an Asylum remake of Oldboy with an aftertaste of the live octopus that Oh Dae Su swallows in the original.

(First published in MiD Day)

Movie Review: R.. Rajkumar

In one excruciatingly long scene of R Rajkumar, Sonu Sood sits with a bunch of his gunda cronies and jovially sings ‘I am your Bull. You are my shit. Together we are Bullshit’.

Never before in the history of Hindi cinema has a film so astutely relayed its intentions from the makers of the film to the viewers. Which is why I need to emulate a song from R Rajkumar to elucidate its overall quality: Gandi film, Gandi gandi gandi gandi gandi film.

Directed by Prabhudheva, R Rajkumar secures the honor of justifying the fact that Bollywood can be full of surprises – just when you think you’ve seen the most annoying film of the year, up pops an even more mind shreddingly irritating one. This movie also earns the prestigious honor of being the only mainstream film of the year that I’ve walked out of (and I’ve sat through Grown Ups 2).

Every limitation of any movie can be forgiven if it makes you laugh. R Rajkumar has only one such moment, when you realize that Bollywood is attempting to make money by trying to make 90’s Telugu movies. At all other times the film is a thoroughly laugh-free, idiotic, juvenile, maddening, moronic, outdated gulag of guano that galls and irritates with every passing second of its interminable stream of pig swill pretending to be humor. The movie was originally called Rambo Rajkumar, and I believe Stallone enforced a ban on the name not because of copyright infringement but because he didn't want Rambo to be associated with something so knowingly wretched.

Here's what happened - a couple of years ago when Rowdy Rathore hit 100 crores a producer realized 'Holy crap! What a magician Prabhudheva is! Someone get him to make another Simbly South style film, hire a fledgling actor and get it done asap! We have a December weekend to exploit!' This theory explains why the plot of the R Rajkumar is reminiscent of 80's Bollywood and 90's Telugu cinema, and that's a huge slap in the face to film buffs. Here's all you need to know about the story - hero joins villain's gang as henchman, both hero and villain like the same girl, hero will do anything to save the girl. That's it. And that was the plot of Once Upon a Time in Mumbai Dobara as well, and the girl in that movie was also Sonakshi Sinha.

The trio of actors involved are: Shahid Kapoor, who we know has better cinema sensibility than this (hint: Kaminey), Sonakshi Sinha who looks like she is extremely grateful for any acting gig that she can get, and Sonu Sood who is both completely devoid of comedic talent and utterly uninterested in anything happening on the set. The love-lust triangle between the three is crass and asinine and utterly unbecoming of a film releasing in 2013. You can't even credit Prabhudheva for trying to evoke ancient mysoginist desi B-cinema because instead of parodying the genre he actually takes it seriously. After two hours of this junk you feel like leaping into the screen and do to the filmmaker what Lisbeth Salander did to her lawyer.

The saddest part of all this is Asrani, who at his age and experience, is handed cringe inducing pathetic lines, and made to tear his clothes and stand in his undies for 'comedy'. His performance here is the absolute zenith of career humiliation, and is used to complement the donkey carnival show of shameless, unfunny and obsolete skits on 'massy hero vs villain'.  You also get choice lines like 'mere mooh mat lagna, mai sehed ke liye haanikaarak hoon', along with a barrage of 'comedic' sound cues. If this is what you want to see in a movie, call me. I have a couch at home. We'll talk about your life, your priorities, your cerebral harmony and what is best for you as a modern civilized human being. I can help. I promise.

(First published in Firstpost)