Tag Archives: Shabana Azmi

Movie Review: Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani (2023)

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3 Stars (out of 4)

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Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani is an overwhelming sensory experience. Every frame is full of vibrant colors, dynamic visuals, and stirring music. A packed movie theater provides the ideal immersive experience for this kind of film. However, watching at home — as I did on a TV screen with an audience of two — it’s harder to ignore the things about Rocky Aur Rani that don’t work.

The performances by the all-star cast are firmly in the category of Things That Work. Ranveer Singh plays the titular Rocky, heir to a sweets company established by his stern grandmother Dhanalaxmi Randhawa (Jaya Bachchan) and run by his equally stern father Tijori (Aamir Bashir). Rocky is nothing like his buttoned-up progenitors, as in he prefers to wear his garishly patterned shirts mostly unbuttoned. He speaks mangled English as he drives around in his expensive sports cars.

Rocky dotes on his grandfather Kanwal (Dharmendra), who suffers from mobility and memory issues. When grandpa utters the name “Jamini” and points to a torn old photo of a woman, Rocky sets out to find her.

Jamini (Shabana Azmi) turns out to be a former flame Kanwal met at a poetry conference, after he was already married to Dhanalaxmi. Rocky meets Jamini’s granddaughter Rani (Alia Bhatt) — a quick-witted TV news anchor — who helps reunite the former lovers on the sly. Coordinating secret meetings between the older couple sparks romance between the younger couple, despite some big differences between them. Rani is as educated and driven as Rocky is not, but ultimately hotness trumps all.

As with every Karan Johar-directed picture, it’s all about loving your family, so Rocky and Rani agree to spend three months (!!!) living with their respective future-in-laws to see if the two clans can co-exist. (Apparently, the love affair between Rocky’s grandpa and Rani’s grandma is not a deal breaker.) Rocky moves in with Rani’s cultured, liberal Bengali family and is immediately clowned upon, and granny Dhanalaxmi freezes out Rani. Things look bleak for our sexy heroes.

The drama, laughs, and heartache in Rocky Aur Rani are punctuated with some grand and truly memorable musical numbers, like the catchy “What Jhumka?” and the visually stunning celebration “Dhindhora Baje Re.” In a funny twist, the only time Rocky ever dresses in a sophisticated manner is during the song “Tum Kya Mile,” when he’s a figment of Rani’s imagination while she’s on a work trip in Kashmir.

The performances overall are charming, with Bhatt again showing that she’s at the top of her game as Rani. Singh is careful to make Rocky a goofball but not an irritant, and it’s always clear that there’s a real person inside the flashy attire. Bachchan also makes the most of her role as mean grandma.

That leads to one of the things that didn’t work for me about Rocky Aur Rani. I’m not sure how an unsophisticated guy like Rocky comes from the family he does. Knowing that he will one day take over the family business, wouldn’t his dad and grandma have sent him overseas to get an MBA and made sure he behaved with perfect decorum? Other than shaming him for his love of dancing, they don’t seem to care what he does. Rocky and his family feel like they belong in two different movies.

I also struggled to nail down the movie’s moral point of view. Rocky Aur Rani makes no secret of when it’s moralizing, with poignant music cueing the audience to pay attention to the meaningful bits. But some of the messages come from strange angles, such as when Rani’s mom Anjali (Churni Ganguly) makes Rocky wear a bra in public in order to teach him gender equality. I have doubts about the lingerie store’s employees participating in an act deliberately meant to humiliate a patron.

Then there’s Rocky’s speech about making socially regressive missteps because he wasn’t taught not to. Singh’s delivery is heartfelt, but it’s strange to hear Rocky ask for leniency because he didn’t know it was rude to make fun of people for their skin color or weight. The whole thing feels like a aging white male standup comic in America lamenting that “you can’t say anything anymore” before ranting about “snowflakes.”

To reiterate what I stated at the start of this review, I think these plot issues may be less glaring when one is watching Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani in a theater on a giant screen with surround sound. Unfortunately, now that its theatrical run is over, the inconsistencies are more apparent.

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Movie Review: What’s Love Got to Do with It? (2022)

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1.5 Stars (out of 4)

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The romantic drama What’s Love Got to Do with It? is unconvincing. The characters seem like they popped into existence just before the events of the movie, and they don’t act like real people.

Lily James stars as “award-winning documentary filmmaker” Zoe. Shazad Latif plays her lifelong pal Kaz, who’s a successful doctor. Zoe’s mom Cath (Emma Thompson) still lives next door to Kaz’s family, and the treehouse where Zoe and Kaz played as kids still sits in the Khan family’s backyard.

Cath is cringe personified, and not in an amusing way. She emerges from the Khans’ house after attending Kaz’s brother’s wedding and declares, “Wasn’t it so wonderfully exotic?” Keep in mind that Cath has known the Khans for at least two decades and has attended multiple family weddings and holiday parties thrown by her Muslim neighbors.

The “exotic” remark is thankfully a one-off, but Kaz has to explain to Cath and Zoe other racist indignities experienced by Pakistani-Brits that his lifelong white neighbors should know by now. It is a huge missed opportunity (and a crime against cinema, frankly) that legendary actors Emma Thompson and Shabana Azmi — who plays Kaz’s mother Aisha — never share a meaningful scene together, which could have provided a chance to address cultural and social issues in a more organic fashion.

Zoe and Kaz are both in their early thirties, and while Zoe is committed to staying single, Kaz is ready to settle down. Having failed to find a girlfriend on his own, he asks his parents to find him a bride via a matchmaker. Zoe pressures Kaz into letting her film the experience for a documentary about arranged marriage tentatively titled “Love Contractually.”

Even this move to film Kaz’s matchmaking process is exotifying. Would Zoe and the bros at the production house providing the funding find white people filling out eHarmony profiles or going on speed dates prestige documentary material? Unlikely, yet that’s what the early stages of Kaz’s process amount to. At best, it’s reality show fodder — and even then they’d have to compete with Indian Matchmaking.

When Kaz fails to click with any British women, he is introduced via Skype to a law student in Lahore named Maymouna (Sajal Aly, who played Sridevi’s stepdaughter in 2017’s Mom). Maymouna is utterly disinterested, but Kaz thinks she’s the one — mostly because she’s 22 and pretty. The Khans, Zoe, and her mom head to Lahore for the nuptials.

The movie takes the long way round to the inevitable conclusion that Kaz and Zoe are the ones who should be together. The meandering path involves a subplot where Zoe dates her mom’s dog’s veterinarian James (Oliver Chris), who she finds underwhelming even though he’s perfectly nice and cute. Zoe makes some equally questionable choices about her film that she springs on Kaz and his family without warning during a screening party. Why she would publicly ambush people she’s known and cared about her whole life is baffling.

For all Kaz’s complaints about not having chemistry with any of the women he’s met, he and Zoe have as much fizz as two-liter bottle of soda that’s been open for a week. Latif’s performance lacks energy, and James is undermined by a character who’s confoundingly written. What’s Love Got to Do with It? is as flat as its central romance.

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Chicago South Asian Film Festival 2017 Highlights

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The 2017 Chicago South Asian Film Festival recently announced its lineup. This year’s event — which runs from September 28 through October 1 — includes a number of intriguing celebrity appearances. Here are some of the notable screenings and question and answer sessions:

  • September 28, 7 p.m.: Signature Move (Q & A with Shabana Azmi)
  • September 29, 8:30 p.m.: Newton (Q & A with Rajkummar Rao)
  • September 30, 2 p.m.: Sonata (Q & A with Shabana Azmi)
  • September 30, 7 p.m.: You Are My Sunday (Q & A with Shahana Goswami)
  • October 1, 5:30 p.m.: Trapped (Q & A with Rajkummar Rao)
  • October 1, 8:15 p.m: Gurgaon (Q & A with Akshay Oberoi)

Festival passes are already on sale. Tickets for individual screenings go on sale September 4.

Movie Review: Loins of Punjab Presents (2007)

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3 Stars (out of 4)

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Through the medium of an absurd local singing competition, Loins of Punjab Presents offers insight into the desi experience in America, as well as plenty of laughs.

This English-language comedy follows the contestants and crew of the first “Desi Idol,” a Bollywood singing contest in New Jersey. The $25,000 cash prize is supplied by Loins of Punjab, the Northeast’s preeminent purveyor of pork loins.

Contestants include a nerdy financial analyst named Vikram (Manish Acharya, who wrote and directed the film); angry rapper Turbanotorious B.D.G (Ajay Naidu); and Sania Rehman (Seema Rahmani), an actress belatedly embracing her Indian roots in the hopes of finding more career opportunities in Mumbai.

There’s also 17-year-old Preeti Patel (Ishita Sharma) and her pushy family. Her parents — dad Sanjeev (Darshan Jariwala) and mom Alpa (Loveleen Mishra) — indulge their daughter’s singing “hobby” and are confused when a high school guidance counselor suggests that Preeti study music in college. The Patel parents generously suggest that if Preeti doesn’t want to be a doctor, she can become an engineer instead.

One contestant is willing to use nefarious means to achieve victory. Socialite Rrita Kapoor (Shabana Azmi) needs the prize money so that she can donate it to charity and win her ongoing PR war with her nemesis: Bubbles Sabharwal.

Though some characters and subplots are more successful that others, there are a lot of gems in Loins of Punjab Presents. Azmi is delightfully villainous. Jariwala plays up his accent, scolding the hotel concierge — played by go-to Bollywood white guy Alexx O’Nell — to find the right reservation by checking the “asses,” when he means “s’s.”

Other performances of note include Jameel Khan as Mr. Bokade, the event’s sleazy promoter; Bokade’s straight man, Mr. White (Kunaal Roy Kapur in one of his first roles); and Rani Bansal, who’s sneakily good in a small role as the contest’s female MC.

Beyond the humor, there are some meaningful subplots, such as the relationship between a Jewish Indophile named Josh Cohen (Michael Raimondi) and his desi girlfriend, Opama (Ayesha Dharkar). She encourages him to participate, only to be confronted by hostility at the presence of a white man in an Indian singing competition.

Josh & Opama’s subplot dovetails with Sania’s to raise questions about national, ethnic, and cultural identity. How obligated are we to embrace our family’s cultural heritage when we have the option to adopt another? What does culture even mean in a country that prides itself on multiculturalism?

Acharya’s film nicely balances serious ideas with humor. It’s also amusing to watch seasoned performers like Azmi, Khan, and Jariwala act in something outside of Bollywood. Loins of Punjab Presents is a lot of fun.

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  • Loins of Punjab Presents at Wikipedia
  • Loins of Punjab Presents at IMDb

Movie Review: Neerja (2016)

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3.5 Stars (out of 4)

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Neerja would be a riveting picture even if it weren’t based on a true story. The fact that it is makes the movie all the more remarkable.

The story begins late in the evening of September 4, 1986, and the action switches between simultaneous events in Mumbai, India, and Karachi, Pakistan. In Mumbai, twenty-two-year-old flight attendant Neerja Bhanot (Sonam Kapoor) returns home from work for a brief rest between shifts. She’s the life of the party and the pride of her parents: father Harish (Yogendra Tiku) and mother Rama (Shabana Azmi).

Meanwhile, in Karachi, a group of Palestinian terrorists prepare to hijack a plane and fly to Cyprus to free their jailed comrades.

Back in Mumbai, Neerja gets ready for her first opportunity to serve as head purser on Pam Am Flight 73 from Mumbai to New York, with stops in Karachi and Frankfurt. Worry-wort Rama wants Neerja to give up the job she loves to focus on her burgeoning modeling career. Bubbly Neerja says good-bye to her folks and her boyfriend, Jaideep (Shekar Ravjiani).

Introducing the terrorists at the same time as Neerja ratchets up the tension early in the film. As the smiling flight attendants greet the boarding passengers in Mumbai, our stomachs churn, knowing who’s waiting for them at their first layover.

The movie maintains its tension by introducing another parallel storyline once the plane lands in Karachi and the two initial storylines intersect: that of Neerja’s anxious parents, waiting for news in an age before cell phones and the internet. Harish waits in his office at the newspaper, but Rama is stuck at home, fretting with chores and trying to convince herself that everything will be all right. Even when the action cuts away from the danger on the plane, our respite is to watch parents wonder if their daughter is alive or dead. It’s heart-wrenching.

Despite her fears, Neerja epitomizes professionalism. She alerts the cabin crew to the hijacking, allowing the pilots to escape. With no one to fly them to Cyprus, the bewildered terrorists hold the passengers hostage, growing angrier as the hours drag on. Throughout, Neerja finds ways to subvert the terrorists murderous plans, keeping her passengers calm and her crew focused. She keeps repeating that she’s just doing her job, as though it’s easy to do with a gun pointed at her head.

Kapoor is amazing, portraying not just Neerja’s courage but her vulnerability as well. She’s not some hardened superhero, but a woman two days shy of her twenty-third birthday. Still, her moments of doubt are brief, her wits sharp. It’s a career performance by Kapoor.

Rama is interesting. She’s raised Neerja to be a dutiful wife, only to wind up with an independent, self-reliant daughter. It’s only through Neerja’s heroic actions during the hijacking that Rama finally comes to see her daughter for who she really is, opening her mind up to more progressive possibilities for other girls. Azmi’s performance is complex and sympathetic.

It’s only a shame that Neerja’s father doesn’t get as much screentime in the present-day scenes as her mother does. It’s his words — in flashbacks — that Neerja remembers when things are at their worst. She’s very much her father’s daughter — his “brave girl” — yet his feelings during the crisis are glossed over.

This is a really remarkable story, and Neerja does great justice to the woman who inspired it. The movie is easily accessible to international audiences, which is fitting Neerja’s commitment to protecting all of her passengers, regardless of the country on their passport.

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Opening May 3: Shootout at Wadala

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One new Hindi movie opens in the Chicago area on May 3, 2013. Sadly, it’s not Bombay Talkies*, but Shootout at Wadala looks like it could be a cool action flick. The trailer features Anil Kapoor using wet laundry to beat up a guy, for Pete’s sake!

Shootout at Wadala opens on Friday at the AMC River East 21 in Chicago, Big Cinemas Golf Glen 5 in Niles, AMC South Barrington 30 in South Barrington, and Regal Cantera Stadium 17 in Warrenville. It has a listed runtime of 2 hrs. 25 min.

Fans of Hindi films may want to check out Mira Nair’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist, which features Bollywood vets Om Puri and Shabana Azmi in supporting roles. It opens locally on Friday at Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema in Chicago.

Other Indian movies playing locally this weekend include Greeku Veerudu (Telugu) at both the Cinemark at Seven Bridges in Woodridge and the Golf Glen 5, which also carries Ethir Neechal (Tamil), Gunde Jaari Gallanthayyinde (Telugu), and Immanuel (Malayalam).

*Director Karan Johar tweeted that Bombay Talkies will release internationally after it premieres at the Cannes Film Festival on May 19.

Movie Review: The Reluctant Fundamentalist (2013)

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3.5 Stars (out of 4)

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The Reluctant Fundamentalist reminds us that the traumas of our personal lives don’t stop for global catastrophes. The movie’s title alone doesn’t tell the whole story. Radical Islam is just one facet of a compelling narrative about some of the major issues of the last twelve years.

The tale of modern times is told through the experiences of Changez Khan (Riz Ahmed). Now a professor in his native Pakistan, Changez is questioned by a journalist — Bobby (Liev Schreiber) — about the kidnapping of an American professor at the same university. Changez stalls in revealing details of the kidnapping to Bobby by explaining how his experiences shaped his conflicted view of America.

Eager to improve the declining fortunes of his artist parents — played by Om Puri and Shabana Azmi — Changez moves to America in the late 1990s to study business. He gets a job at a Bain Capital-type firm that specializes in making companies more profitable, usually by laying off employees. He falls in love with Erica (Kate Hudson), the artsy niece of the head of his firm.

The attacks of 9/11 happen while Changez is on assignment in the Philippines, and he returns to the U.S to find that the rules of society have changed for him. In the film’s most disturbing scene, the rest of his team members waltz through airport security while Changez is subjected to an invasive strip search solely because of his ethnicity. His relationship with Erica deteriorates, and Changez wonders if America is really where he belongs.

After playing a villain in Trishna, Ahmed shows his versatility in The Reluctant Fundamentalist. Ahmed makes Changez sympathetic and relatable as he navigates a society that isn’t the pure meritocracy he expected it to be. His best friend, Wainwright (Nelsen Ellis), is the only other member of a racial minority employed at their firm. Among whites — including his boss, played by Kiefer Sutherland, and even his girlfriend — Changez feels treated like a token and not a real person.

In addition to the presence of Bollywood veterans Puri and Azmi, fans of Hindi films will find a lot of thematically familiar material in The Reluctant Fundamentalist. Changez’s troubled romantic relationship with Erica suffers as much from an undercurrent of prejudice as it does from problems in Erica’s past. He likewise struggles with disappointing his parents, who aren’t impressed by his material ambitions, even when they benefit from them. With a runtime of 130 minutes and a leisurely approach to storytelling, the pace of the film will feel familiar to Bollywood fans as well.

Early in The Reluctant Fundamentalist, Changez tells Bobby that understanding only comes with patience. It’s a criticism of American mistakes in the country’s rush to deal with Islamic terrorism, but it is also good advice for how to watch the movie. Those willing to embrace the personal drama within the movie’s larger story about American interference in Pakistan will be rewarded.

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Movie Review: Matru Ki Bijlee Ka Mandola (2013)

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4 Stars (out of 4)

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In my attempt to find the best way to explain why I like an unconventional movie like Matru Ki Bijlee Ka Mandola as much as I do, I found my answer in my review of director Vishal Bhardwaj’s previous effort, the magnificent 7 Khoon Maaf:
“7 Khoon Maaf is an all-or-nothing film. It either works for you or it doesn’t. Its strangeness will be a turn-off for some viewers, while others will lament a lack of explosive action scenes. But, if you’re in the mood for something a little different, beware: Susanna might just steal your heart.”

I feel the same way about Matru Ki Bijlee Ka Mandola (MKBKM, henceforth). I love it, but I understand why some people won’t. It’s a slow burn, with characters that are hard to pin down and a few odd elements that have to be accepted on faith rather than understood with reason. I think it’s fabulous.

The plot of MKBKM is the opposite of high-concept. In short, the story is about a wealthy man’s attempt to convert his land and the small village that sits on it into a massive factory, shopping mall, and apartment complex. Naturally, the villagers object to the plan, as do the man’s servants, his daughter, and strangely enough, the man himself.

See, the rich man, Mandola (Pankaj Kapur) has a dual personality: he’s a ruthless, ambitious tycoon in the sober light of day, and a populist by night, once he starts drinking. His handler, Matru (Imran Khan), is supposed to keep Mandola away from liquor. But Matru has little incentive to do so, as Mandola is a nicer guy when he’s drunk. Early in the film, an inebriated Mandola leads the villagers in a protest outside the gates of his own mansion, until he sobers up and realizes what he’s doing.

Mandola wants the factory in part to woo a fetching government minister, Chaudhari Devi (Shabana Azmi), and also to secure a prosperous future for his only daughter, Bijlee (Anushka Sharma). He’s gone so far as to get Bijlee engaged to the minister’s son, Baadal (Arya Babbar), who, Matru repeatedly reminds Bijlee, is an idiot. Matru and Bijlee are, of course, a far more appropriate couple, despite their differences in economic class.

Bhardwaj includes a number of quirky elements in the film to elevate it beyond a simple parable about the dangers of progress at any cost. A scene in which Mandola confirms his plans with Chaudhari explicitly evokes images of the witches in Macbeth and takes place amid ruins on a hilltop reminiscent of Weathertop in The Fellowship of the Ring.

Promos for MKBKM featured one of the recurring visual themes: a life-sized hot pink buffalo that Mandola sees whenever his longing for his beloved liquor becomes too strong.

My favorite oddball touch is the way Bhardwaj deals with something that would’ve been a throw-away gag in any other movie. When Baadal first sees Bijlee in the movie, he’s accompanied by an African folk dance group that he purchased in an attempt to impress her. Rather than just disappear after the joke is over, the folk group remains through the rest of the film. They take over a room in Mandola’s mansion, join in dance numbers, and protest alongside the villagers.

That detail alone makes the movie for me. What else would one expect to happen to a foreign dance group transported to rural India? Bhardwaj — who co-wrote the screenplay with Abhishek Chaubey — takes a practical problem and turns it to his advantage.

The performances are great throughout: Pankaj Kapur growls his way through his dialog as cantankerous Mandola; Anushka Sharma is as spunky and lovable as ever; Azmi and Babbar are appropriately diabolical; and Imran Khan is clever and sexy as a budding revolutionary, whose sidekicks include an old man, a blind preteen, and a transvestite.

Matru Ki Bijlee Ka Mandola is a must see. Even if you don’t love it, you won’t see anything else quite like it.

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Movie Review: It’s a Wonderful Afterlife (2010)

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1.5 Stars (out of 4)

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Many American comedies of the 1980s were characterized by amusing situations, rather than genuinely humorous dialog (think Mannequin or Soul Man). The decades haven’t been kind to films of this style, because they simply aren’t funny. The British comedy It’s a Wonderful Afterlife relies on this ’80s style of humor, and as such, already feels dated.

The movie opens with a man — having been force-fed too much spicy curry in by a faceless villain — receiving treatment in a hospital room, only to have his stomach explode, spraying its contents all over the room. There’s no context for the gag, so it’s not at all humorous, just disgusting. Not a good way to start a movie.

The exploding man is explained to be the latest victim of a serial killer targeting members of the Indian community in the London suburb of Southall. The police, led by inspector Smythe (Mark Addy), enlist the help of a detective of Indian descent named Raj (Sendhil Ramamurthy) to search for clues within the community.

Raj is the childhood friend of Roopi (Goldy Notay), an overweight young woman still recovering from being dumped by her fiance. Roopi’s mother, Mrs. Sethi (Shabana Azmi), is desperate to see her daughter married — so desperate that she’s been killing prospective husbands that have rejected Roopi, as well as their family members, using her culinary skills.

Mrs. Sethi is haunted by the ghosts of her victims, who can’t move on until Mrs. Sethi is dead. The only other person who can sense the ghosts is Roopi’s best friend, Linda (Golden Globe winner Sally Hawkins), who’s renamed herself Geetali after a spiritual awakening on a trip to India. Mrs. Sethi promises to kill herself after Roopi is married, provided the ghosts help her accomplish her mission.

It’s a Wonderful Afterlife is full of missed opportunities. The ghosts, who should be a goldmine of humor, instead offer bland observations and little in the way of assistance to Mrs. Sethi, as they have no supernatural powers. Their decaying visages are pointlessly gross.

Mrs. Sethi should be a source of comedy herself, but she’s dull as well. She never exhibits a hint of the kind of rage one would need to feel in order to commit murder (all but one of the murders happen off-screen). Her conversations with the ghosts are just boring exposition.

Part of the movie’s problem is that the Roopi and her mother get overshadowed by the ghosts, the cops, and especially Linda. Much screen time is spent on Linda’s psychic abilities, scenes in which Roopi, the heroine, acts as a passive observer. Roopi’s budding romance with Raj is shown in a short musical montage, yet a multiple scenes are devoted to Linda’s engagement to Dev (Jimi Mistry). Linda’s even the star of the film’s climax, a revolting homage to the movie Carrie.

Sally Hawkins is good as Linda, and newcomer Goldy Notay gives a strong performance as Roopi as well. I’d have preferred that she be given more to do, as the movie is all about Roopi’s want of a husband, after all. Still, there’s not much that could have saved It’s a Wonderful Afterlife — not even a pandering shot of Sendhil Ramamurthy shirtless — since the alleged comedy just isn’t funny.

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