3 idiots – movie review ( and how it’s close to my college life)

Went to see the movie “3 idiots” today. Some incidents in the movie are very similar to incidents in my college life.

But let me do the review first and then get back to the college life stuff

 

3 idiots claims to be from the book “Five Point Someone” but I found it sufficiently different from the book and sufficiently similar to many college stories that you would have read.

Aamir Khan , Madhavan and Sharman Joshi play three college buddies who have a lot of fun in college. They question the education system, deal with hardships in life and then go their separate ways to meet later in the end.

That’s pretty much the crux of the story. The first half of the film is really hilarious!

Some parts and characters are clearly unbelievable

1. Boman Irani as “Virus” – while his accent and eccentricity were hilarious as first – it turns out to be an exaggeration – I’d have loved it if the director had portrayed Virus to be an exaggeration only in the students’ heads and not in real life
2. The delivery scene where Aamir lights up the makeshift operating table and does the delivery using a webcam + vacuum cleaner cannot be believed

Some scenes are hilarious!

1. The scene where Aamir Khan mixes up the words in his friend’s speech. I was almost rolling on the floor laughing
2. Sharman Joshi’s comments are really funny.

The connection with my college

Me and my best friend Kaushal, had once climbed up the water tank, gotten drunk and had chats like the ones they showed in the movie. After getting drunk and having loads of alcohol and coming down from the tank , we somehow managed to reach the hostel. I then ran across the field in my college, crossed into the ladies hostel of the college next to mine and kissed my then-girlfriend. ( in the movie Aamir Khan sneaks into the Prinicpals’ house and almost kisses Kareena Kapoor )

There are more similarities but I cant say it on a public blog

Verdict

Positives

1. Spirited performances by the lead trio
2. Some really hilarious dialogues

Negatives:

1. some over the top senti scenes.
2. Boman Irani’s character could have been better developed – it was too caricatured I feel.
3. the delivery scene is too unreal to be believed
4. Sharman Joshi’s family problem was made fun of – could have been handled in a better way.

Overall, the film is worth a watch once – it’s no classic and certainly not Aamir Khan’s finest performance.

Worth a few laughs.

Paa - Movie Review

When I saw the promo of Paa, it looked like the the director (R Balki) had seen the Curious Case of Benjamin Button and had decided to copy it.

Turns out I was wrong.

Amitabh Bachchan portrays a person who has progeria – a rare genetic disease due to which people age very fast. So while Amitabh’s character looks like he’s 70 years old, his biological age is actually 13-14.

Abhishek Bachchan plays a upcoming politician who’s an MP

Vidya Balan is a doc and is the mother of Auro. Junior B is his biological father.

Junior B and Vidya Balan “do it” without protection and thus a baby is on the way. Junior B does not want the baby, so he asks Vidya to abort. She refuses; Auro is born and cared for by her and her mother ( whom Auro calls “bum” )

Junior B is shown as a straight-faced straight-talking up and coming politicial – a typical Hindi movie stereotype.

Junior B goes to a school – meets Auro – likes him – they hang out for a while – Junior B later discovers that that Auro is his biological son – Junior B is sorry – he tries to “patao” Vidya – Auro is dying – before he dies he gets Junior B and Vidya together

That’s essentially the story

There is another story arc ( towards the beginning of the story ) where Junior B is trying to do good for the slum wallahs – but that has nothing to do with the story at all!

The politician angle is complete unnecessary  and has not bearing to the story at all – I was puzzled to see why it is included.

The ending is pretty crappy

Verdict

Positives:

1. Big B’s makeup and performance
2. Big B’s dialogues and punch lines are really good.

Negatives:

1. Weak performances by Vidya Balan and (surprisingly ) Paresh Rawal
2. Bad direction and bad editing
3. Junior B’s role is weird especially the politician angle.
4. Lousy songs.

In a nutshell:

See it, if you want to , only for Big B. Junior B is a let down – especially since I expect so much from him after his performance in “Sarkar” and “Sarkaar Raaj”