I never thought there would be a Shahrukh Khan film that I just outright hated... but this one wins that prize. It's just... what? What the...? Seriously?
I know it is going for a very pertinent message that is connected with India's inner political struggles, the mistreatment of people from the provinces, and terrorism, etc. There are some hard truths and statements in this movie, but that is not why I hated it. I hated it because they tried to throw a love story in with all that, and they did is so very badly. Seriously, Fanaa is pretty much about the same thing and it's way better. Especially the love story part.
So, what makes it so bad is the premise of the love story. Amar (Shahrukh) is a Radio DJ travelling to the outer regions and more war torn parts of India, the rebelling parts, and he randomly sees this girl (Manisha Koirala) at the train station one night. Then he obsessively falls in love with her on sight, knowing nothing about her. That's enough to make this movie die. He obsessively follows her every time he sees her, despite her protests that he leave her alone and that she doesn't want to see him, and they try to hint that she loves him despite all her protests. Nope, I'm not seeing that. He looks like a creepy stalker boy and she looks like an abused girl who is not strong enough to protest enough. That's enough to put me off.
Then he goes back to Delhi, after she leaves him completely with a cryptic type note in the sand that says they pretty much have never met. He is depressed, decides to marry the girl his family picks out for him (Preity Zinta, in her debut role). Then the girl comes back. She is a terrorist on a suicide bomber mission. They give brief backstory that includes her and her sister being raped by soldiers, people getting killed, etc. She pops back into Amar's life, right before the wedding, and he goes cray cray stalker again.
Before ruining the whole plot of the good parts- as in the terrorism part- I will just leave it as this. What the heck? Why is this dude so obsessed with a girl who never gave him the time of day? I know we're supposed to believe that she secretly liked him too, but that was definitely not made apparent. Also, it could have had more set up for the terrorism part instead of the sudden, hello! We're suicide bombers! Yay! Let's use this dude to get to the bombing site! Woohoo! What it ended up being was a half-a romance AND a half-a terrorist plot. They needed to pick one or develop both more. The end.
Weird Song- supposed to convince us they were in love:
Satarangi Re
Weird Dance:
Jiya Jale
Train Song/Dance Number:
Chaiyya Chaiyya
No comments:
Post a Comment