Raja Sen - You Sir, are a moron !

Its been a while since I have posted anything on this completely dormant blog of mine and after a couple of years of having forgotten about its existence...I am back !!

I must admit though that the reason for this triumphant return has been this sudden urge to spew venom somewhere about a particular movie reviewer(Name mentioned in the title) who has really got my goat ! If you are a regular reader of Rediff.com, you probably would be familiar with his articles. They are really not that hard to miss and in that sense, credit must be given to him for grabbing your eyeballs with his sensational statements followed by an almost deliberately biased review that has to be different from the rest of the world's opinion about anything.

In what is an addition to his unenviable list of trashy reviews, he has now proceeded to give Zindagi na milegi Dobara a 1 and half star rating. I have never understood the parameters he judges a movie by but that kind of rating is what I would traditionally reserve for movies that are absolute drivel and having watched the movie myself yesterday, it is far from that. Admittedly, it is not the greatest there is and the movie is a tad too long but it is much, much better than the regular Bollywood fare. This is not the first time though that he has come up with reviews that have been downright ridiculous for movies that deserved better. Given below is a list of reviews that he has given for some movies that I(and many others based on their collections) liked.

3 Idiots - 2 stars - "Three Idiots, Two Stars, One Missed Opportunity"

Rajneeti - 1 and a half stars - " The screenplay is weak, manipulative and every possible kind of lazy"

Rock on(Music Review) - 1 and a half stars - "Rock Yawn !!"

Other than these, he has proceeded with statements such as X-Men: First Class is better than The Dark Knight and that Om Shanti Om is among the best movies made by women directors in India ! The irritating bit other than having to read these atrocious statements is that it almost looks like he is one of the majority shareholders at Rediff because we are subjected to another article where he gives his views on the Formula one race of the weekend ! All of these articles have headlines with 'Raja Sen reviews so-and-so' or 'Ask Raja Sen about Formula One' or 'Raja Sen predicts the Oscars' as if the guy is a celebrity whose opinions on anything should be taken as the final word !! It is laughable that anyone would even want to know about the race of the weekend from an idiot who probably sits at home with his DVD collection and plays with his remote control cars due to the severe lack of friends that he no doubt must suffer from for being so opinionated !

Back to the movie though that really got me fired up. I did read the reviews before going for it with a certain special someone( The 1 and a half one almost ruined it but then I figured it is Raja Sen so the opposite must hold true). ZNMD is a good movie that deserves 3 stars at least. It could have been great had it been trimmed a bit. It is all about the kind of expectations you go in with. I went in expecting to see 3 guys on a road trip in a beautiful country with lots of conversational jokes here and there and thats exactly what I got. It is no DCH and in many ways, it doesn't even aspire to be one. The road trip itself is shot beautifully and though the characters in this story are filthy rich , I identified with the essence of such a journey since I have been on a few with my buddies. Their luck with girls is unreal but then that is where you realize it is basically a commercial movie and not a regular video of 3 guys on a road trip. The latter would be a great idea but would also need guys you can identify with as I am sure not many people can really identify with looking like Hrithik at any level unless they are in the movies themselves !

The performances are good all around. Hrithik is excellent as the stuck-up corporate guy who learns to enjoy life through the journey. He does overdo the busy,rich guy bit initially but gradually does better in the role. Farhan is very good as the prankster of the group and Abhay Deol is great as the balancing factor amongst the three. The camaraderie they share is believable especially considering that in the context of the story,they are supposed to have met after a long time. Both Katrina and Kalki are believable in their roles as well and this is probably the first time that I have felt that the former actually got a role that fits her perfectly. The movie looks great and the songs are perfectly placed. I am assuming that Spain is now going to be on the Places-to-visit for most people now !

On the negative side, the movie is long as mentioned before. Farhan Akhtar's poems that keep making their appearance in the movie are unnecessary and made no sense to me. The movie also lacks a certain something that would hold it together as it depends solely on the performances to get across the line.

Well, there goes my first ever review. I would say that considering everything it is still a one time watch and since I haven't really seen a movie where the characters have a pact like this, I would say it is an original script and that really should be reason enough to watch movies like this especially if you have lost faith in most of the copycat Bollywood movies these days like I have.

Raja Sen mentions in his review that the movie is trying too hard to be cool. I frankly think the same about him. He needs to stop his pretense and almost child-like quality of wanting to be the center of attraction by being different with his comments. Stop being a party pooper, Raja Sen because at the end of the day you are basically pooping in a party and that sure can't be a good thing even if it is to get everyones attention?