I read so you don’t have to: A week of mockery
This is the week we learned that the ‘softer’ side of Pakistan can be quite harsh too. A much-hyped movie has been mocked more than loved, we love our iPads but don’t know how to use them and continue to mock ourselves. Sure, there is good news coming out of the country but it is so scarce and so unimportant amid the general gloom that we’d probably be better off just ignoring it altogether. So let’s take the bad with the worse and have a cynical look back at the week that just passed. (June 24 – July 1) Best of the ...
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Bol: Speaking silence
Shoaib Mansoor’s Bol is brutally honest. Based on the stories of Hakeem Sahib’s Sunni-Syed household of seven daughters, the movie adeptly focuses on gender issues at large, dwelling on tensions between fossilised cultural practices and new ones, speaking well to tensions underlying many South Asian households. With reports on the status of women’s rights in Pakistan doing rounds, Mansoor’s social commentary is timely for villages, towns and cities across the country. Before the screening for human rights activists and politicians at a small non-commercial setting in Islamabad on June 11, Mansoor told his female audience that this was every Pakistani woman’s ...
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Super 8: Super indeed
I must confess I’m a major fan of JJ Abrams. His TV-series Lost was almost like a religious experience for me and his next show Fringe almost as good. His versions of Star Trek was very enjoyable and Mission Impossible 3 and Cloverfield were good fun as well. So, I had high hopes for his latest offering, Super 8. News of Steven Spielberg joining the project as producer only helped raise expectations even further andI not disappointed. Plot (Minor spoilers): The movie is set in Lillian, a fictional small town in Ohio, USA and focuses on the experiences of ...
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Kung Fu Paindoo
Yesterday, I had another encounter with Disney*: I watched Kung Fu Panda 2. The bits I loved, and I really loved them, were the jokes. So when the Evil King, a peacock with a stainless steel body and lethal blade-feathers, yells exultantly to its minion-wolf: “CALL IN THE WOLVES! All of them! I want them ready to move! The Year of the Peacock begins NOW!” The minion, instead of running along to hasten the orders, pauses, “Right now?” he wonders aloud. “‘Cause it’s the middle of the year, so you’d only get, like, half of the Year of the Peacock.” But generally speaking ...
Read Full PostX-men: Third class
It seems impossibly difficult to make a movie based on existing material that isn’t a book. Comics, video games, toys all make for bad script, cardboard acting and clichéd emotions. Or at least, that’s what Transformers, Bloodrayne, Prince of Persia and now X-men: First Class lead one to believe. Plot: Directed by Matthew Vaughn(of Kick-Ass fame) the movie finds us in prequel mode. The setting is the 60s, during the Cuban Missile Crisis, with a brief glimpse of World War 2. Primarily the movie focuses around two characters, Charles Xavier and Eric Lenshher/Magneto and how the world initially comes to ...
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Ready: Brainless entertainment
For all of you who had great expectations from Salman Khan after Wanted and Dabangg, Ready does not disappoint. The movie has all the elements of a typical Bollywood masala film – songs, goons, chases and fights. Of course, serious movie watchers may wish to opt out of this movie, but if you are looking for a great time with friends and family, Ready is for you! Salman Khan, plays the hero named Prem (for the fourteenth time) who is under familial pressure to get married. Sanjana (Asin), a run away bride on the run, lands at his house as the potential ...
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Everything you always knew about Lollywood
I have to hand it to the Pakistani film industry of the 1980s and 1990s. Each film never failed to be a block buster hit regardless of having a very predictable plot line – the good guys, the bad guys and the age old triumph of good over evil, and yes, the hero gets the prettiest girl on the screen and all go home happy. This is a typical filmi “happily ever after.” Does any of this sound familiar? I present to you my small list of movie conventions back from the 1980s with the sole purpose of making you ...
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Haunted: More laughter than fear
The Indian horror film, Haunted, is one of those films which will make you alternate between laughing hysterically and covering your eyes out of fear. The film really has nothing new to it and is the typical sub-continent love story, where boy meets girl and would do anything to help her. Except this time, he’s not saving her from an evil step-father, the owner of a brothel or a terrorist; instead, he’s saving her from the evil spirit of her piano teacher who has kept her spirit trapped for 80 years raping her every night. The rape was what got to ...
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Fast five: Sheer adrenalin
If this movie has to be described in two words, “sheer adrenalin” would be appropriate. Two hours and 10 minutes of a thrilling ride is what viewers should expect before hitting the theatres. Fast Five is all about heart-stopping action sequences, nerve wrecking suspense, signature car race scenes along with a bit of an emotional appeal. Writer Chris Morgan and director Justin Lin, the brains behind the mind blowing production, start exactly where Fast & Furious ended. Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel) is busted out while he is being transferred to prison, after which crew decides to go their separate ways ...
Read Full PostLos Angeles versus aliens: Who wins? Who cares!
Battle: Los Angeles is a film that won’t confuse you with plot twists and multi-dimensional characters. The 1 hour 56 minute film is a straight-up, military-oriented, alien invasion film powered by the basics: tension and heroics. It may not be an original concept, but director Jonathan Liebesman (Texas chainsaw massacre: The beginning) and writer Christopher Bertolini (The General’s Daughter) put together a film that is a thrilling ride. The plot Alien beings have invaded major cities across the globe. Only this time, the battle field is Los Angeles. A squad of marines is busy evacuating civilians from Los Angeles, which the military is about to nuke. There are ...
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