March 20th was the day of small budgeted releases. Five such movies were released. Firaaq, Barah Aana, Straight, Lottery, Aloo Chaat. Lottery was absolutely out of question. Abhijeet Sawant had always been unbearable. Despite being Nandita’s debut Firaaq was not priority. Of course, I would watch but not soon. And same goes for Straight and Aloo Chaat. Barah Aana was on top of mind and it is still there. I haven’t watched it yet. So, I saw Gulaal once again. However, as the week progressed I saw Aloo Chaat and Straight (by chance) and circumstances yet dodged me to watch Barah Aana. This week three Hindi movies got released and I had seen Videsh (Heaven on Earth) before its release in India. So, one more Friday went without First Day First Show. I am planning to catch Barah Aana and Aa Dekhen Zara this weekend.

Aloo Chaat: 2.5 Stars

Aftab returns to India from USA to find his family looking out for a girl for him. He is already in love with a Muslim girl (Aamna) in USA. The conservative family can accept a videshi-bahu but not a musalman. He along with his father’s friend Hakeem Tarachand (Manoj Pahwa at his usual best) plots a story. The movie works only when Kulbhushan Kharbanda, Manoj Pahwa and Sanjay Mishra are on screen. Whenever this trio appear, it is a treat. Also Aftab’s granny (Dolly Ahluwalia) in few scenes. Rest of them were below average. Aamna Sharief cannot act and dance AT ALL. Not an impressive debut. The best part was the witty dialogues here and there. 2.5 just for some of the wittiest lines and Manoj Pahwa.

Videsh: 2 stars

Well-educated Punjabi Kudi (Preity Zinta) marries a Canadian-Indian. She suffers at the hand of obnoxious mother-in-law and irate husband (Vansh Bhardawaj). Deepa has a way of showing the intricacies, the minutest details get covered when she comes on board. I thoroughly enjoyed her Fire, 1947 Earth and Water. But I did not enjoy Videsh as much. In fact, I was disappointed with the way it progresses towards the second half.

It's all about belief in the shesh-naag theory. Few will, and few will not. I do not. But, that doesn't hinder me from appreciating a good cinema. Shesh-Naag theory will not go down with many people for sure. It did not go down with me and I am not taking that as a bias. It's fictional. But, as a whole, it lacked soul.

Preity and Vansh are the only people worth watching. It is delight when they are on screen (quite often) but the side happenings deter the pace and in the end it just turns out to be another story of Wife-Married-To-NRI-Suffers. Nonetheless, I rate this as Preity’s finest work. I give 2 to the movie and 4 to Preity.

Straight: 2 stars

Pinu Patel (Vinay Pathak), hotelier in London runs to India with his uncle-aunt-cousin to marry an Indian girl. The girl runs away. He comes back. He is dejected. He is virgin for long now. He cries at his state. Things get worse for him when his employee Kamlesh in the state of jubilation kisses him on lips. Pinu is now confused about his sexuality. The movie could have been a well-brought-up-all-the-way-through if story post interval did not become clichéd. Direction, performances apart, movie is outlandish. Parvati’s debut Rules, Pyaar Ka Superhit Formula was better than this. She loses her touch this time. To add to it, I would say I am getting tired of Vinay now. I am sure if he keeps going this way, few years down the line it would be very hard for me to differentiate Dasvidaniya from Oh! My God and Bheja Fry from Straight. And he will be remembered more as SRK’s sidekick (Rab Ne.. ) or Madhuri’s actor (Aaja Nach Le). This is scary. He is a genius but getting repetitive.

This week also saw me meeting Oz (of PassionForCinema). For uninitiated, he along with Anurag started the website for Cine Maniacs called Passion For Cinema. He lives in USA and is currently on a tour here. I recommend his torture series on the site for every filmi enthusiast. I started writing on PFC last October and after 3 in a row articles I got bored (typical of me) and confided myself just as regular reader and commenter there. My procrastination did not make me author there, still I made some filmi friends there and thanks to them I got to meet Oz. A second chance meet and planned third before he scooted off made me his bhakt for life. The guy is a living encyclopedia of movies. Without sounding immodest he was impressed with my knowledge of Bollywood of 60s, 70s and 80s which is hardly observed these days in new-age-bloggers (as he calls those born in 80s) and left me his personal contact number. Anyways, I got to hear some of the amazing untold stories of Bollywood first hand. The stories that cannot be accommodated any where in writing. What else a filmi wants?

If these things were not an adequate amount to make me contented, my twin brother whose first brush with Abhay Deol was Oye Lucky! Lucky Oye and then Dev.D asked me for DVDs of Abhay’s movies. He was having a long weekend and he wanted to watch other movies of Abhay. I handed him the movies of Abhay in the chronological order of their release. He loved Socha Na Tha. He found Manorama – 6FU his best (after Dev.D, exactly the way I feel) and we just finished watching Ek Chaalis Ki Last Local. He enjoyed the movie. I was watching his expression now and then. Aahista-Aahista and Honeymoon Travels Pvt. Ltd. are in offing this weekend. My bro doesn’t easily appreciate any actor/director/performance/story. He is equally enthusiast of a movie but of a different sort. He doesn’t read any reviews (not even mine), he doesn’t crave for a movie the way I do. He watches them at his own pace. He might take years to watch even a gem of a movie but he will never rush himself (unlike me). He can talk of the intricacies like a pro. He doesn’t just watch movies. He absorbs them when he wants to. I won’t say he is a convert as of now when it comes to Abhay but he did say one thing: Abhay is natural. The last time he said same was for Irrfan Khan in Maqbool and Ajay Devgan in Company and Omkara. His favorite now is Ransa (Abhimanyu Singh) from Gulaal.

Some good small-budgeted movies, a meet with a fellow filmi, and re-runs of Abhay’s movies. I am having an amazing week.