Movie Review of Latest Hindi Films

Tees Maar Khan

Producer: Shirish Kunder, Ronnie Screwvala, Twinkle Khanna
Director: Farah Khan
Starring: Akshay Kumar, Akshaye Khanna, Katrina Kaif, Raghu Ram, Rajiv Laxman and Arya Babbar
Music: Vishal-Shekhar, Shirish Kunder
Lyrics: Shirish Kunder, Vishal Dadlani, Anvita Dutt Guptan

I’ve always been a fan of Manmohan Desai cinema, Farah Khan’s unapologetic masala outings and Akshay Kumar. Farah Khan’s stories have been shamelessly commercial and mass-driven the screenplays (by Khan and Abbas Tyrewala for Main Hoon Na, and Khan, Mayur Puri and Mushtaq Sheikh for Om Shanti Om) have been smartly written for universal acceptance and a hundred percent entertainment guarantee that has worked for both her films, thus ensuring a blockbuster status for them. And now, she’s back with Tees Maar Khan, a film that has been penned by her husband and editor Shirish Kunder, who has previously written and directed Jaan-E-Mann, which is yet another movie I’ve loved for its sheer honesty.

The film has a lot going for it, honestly. Sheila Ki Jawaani, Farah Khan, eye-catching promos and there you have it. It is the first film Farah Khan’s doing without Shah Rukh Khan and his production company, thereby starting her own home production with Shirish Kunder. Instead, she signs Akshay Kumar and Katrina Kaif in lead roles, the latter's pairing with Kumar has always been a successful and compatible one on-screen. more at

Udaan (New)

Producer: Sanjay Singh, Anurag Kashyap, Ronnie Screwvala
Director: Vikramaditya Motwane
Starring: Rajat Barmecha, Ronit Roy, Aayan Boradia, Ram Kapoor, Manjot Singh, Anand Tiwari Sumant Mastkar, Raja Hudda, Varun Khettry, Varun Khettry, Akshay Sachdev
Music: Amit Trivedi
Lyrics: Amitabh Bhattacharya, Anurag Kashyap
Genre: Drama

Udaan starts of with a bunch of youngsters sneaking away from their boarding school (Bishop Cotton in Shimla) to go watch a film in the local town. They are caught and expelled, and Rohan (Rajat Barmecha) the hero of this film, returns after eight years to a father he hasn’t seen in a long time. Reaching home to a cold reception, motherless Rohan finds that he now also has a six year old step-brother, Arjun (Boradia) the issue from his father’s second failed marriage.

Rohan's authoritarian father Bhairav Singh (Ronit Roy), is a cruel task-master and enrolls artistically inclined Rohan into an engineering college, and also makes him work part-time at his factory. The only light in Rohan’s blighted life is his childless Uncle (Ram Kapoor) and Aunt, who attempt to give Rohan and Arjun the parental love their biological father seems devoid of. Deriding and mocked by his father for his dreams of being a writer, which in his book is akin to being a loser/wimp/unmanly, it looks like Rohan is caught in an unending nightmare, his escape blocked by concerns for his little brother. Will he ever have the courage to break out? more at

Band Baaja Baaraat

Producer: Aditya Chopra
Director: Maneesh Sharma
Starring: Ranveer Singh, Anushka Sharma, Manmeet Singh, Manish Choudhary, Neeraj Sood.
Music: Salim-Sulaiman
Lyrics: Amitabh Bhattacharya

Nobody expects anything from the house of Yash Raj Films anymore! This is not only a big problem, but an unfortunate fact for the producers of the film Band Baaja Baaraat, produced by Aditya Chopra under the banner of Yash Raj Films. Until four years ago, one would expect a mega-blockbuster or quality urban cinema from almost every movie coming out of the production house, but the epic failure of the 2007 film Jhoom Barabar Jhoom and the consecutive failure of Pradeep Sarkar’s Laaga Chunari Mein Daag changed almost everything. Post then it’s been raining flops except for an occasional Chak De! India or New York. Then there are smaller hits like Badmaash Company and bigger ones like Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi. The whole pattern makes it clearer that the potential viewer would expect more from the other release No Problem than this one.

However, it’s too early to judge a movie before watching it; which is why questions like “How good will this movie before my money?” and “Will this be better than the products that have come out of Yash Raj of late?” tend to arise. Whether these questions generate into positive answers or not is reflected in my brief analysis below. more at

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