Bollywoods "Fight Club" Movie Review

Action films will never go out of fashion. Bollywood has seen a spate of romantic musicals and family dramas in the last few years, so it was getting a little cranky. That's why action flicks come in as a fresh whiff of air. FIGHT CLUB is an action film and true to its theme it quite succeeds in packing the punch! Vikram Chopra here shows that he is adept with the technical aspects of filmmaking. But the script is a let down and hence the execution is hampered.

FIGHT CLUB is the story of four friends, Vicky (Zayed Khan), Karan (Dino Morea), Somil (Ritiesh Deshmukh) and Diku (Ashish Chaudhary) who stumble Send Fight Club Ecardsupon the idea of starting a Fight Club, where people get the opportunity to bash up their enemies and settle the scores. But constant run-in with the police just starts nagging them and the action then shifts to Delhi. The four buddies now start a suburban club and are joined by the brawny bouncer Sameer (Sohail Khan). But in the process, they call upon the wrath of the fiery gang lords (Rahul Dev, Ashmit Patel, Yash Tonk) and a flaming rivalry ensues thereon that, but naturally, makes the way for blood-soaked action and adrenaline filled excitement.

FIGHT CLUB could have been better! It begins on a promising note, though one feels that the film falters somewhere in the middle. The story however is fine, but the screenplay is the real culprit. The scenes just don't propel the narrative and the dialogues aren't better too! The cramming together of a gang full of actors might just be the reason that the film tails off from its premise. The conjecture to give every actor a sufficient screen-time just contrived the narration.

On the plus side, one must say that the action sequences choreographed by Abbas Ali Moghul are first-rate. Sudeep Chatterjee does a brilliant job with some graceful cinematography. The music by Pritam is good though the songs are just intruded to fill in the space. This film could have done without the songs and dance routine as the pace of the film could have been sustained.

On the acting front, Zayed Khan, Sohail Khan and Suniel Shetty get the maximum footage, while the others are just as passable. Ritiesh Deshmukh is wasted in a role that could have just brought him out of the tag of a comedy actor. The ladies in the film don't have much to do anyway, all the three - Dia Mirza, Amrita Arora and Neha Dhupia - just add up to the glamour quotient.

Considering that this is Vikram Chopra's directorial debut, he has done a pretty decent job as far as handling his cast and crew is concerned. He has tried to extract maximum from them but the faulty script and too much emphasis on the technical stuff has marred the execution. However the credit should go to him and the producers for trying something really fresh as far as action films are concerned. Unfortunately, FIGHT CLUB is just another action movie, which otherwise had the potential of being a solid entertainer.

Madhuri Dixit to perform at Filmfare awards?

Indo-Asian News Service

Mumbai, Feb 21 (IANS) Bollywood diva Madhuri Dixit is rehearsing with Saroj Khan for a special performance to commemorate the late Parveen Babi at the 51st Fair One Filmfare awards to be held at Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) Grounds here Feb 25.

After a gap of four years, the two dancing queens have teamed up for a performance. The last time they worked together was in Sanjay Leela Bhansali's magnum opus "Devdas".

The other major performance will be by Abhishek Bachchan and Ashwarya Rai, who are currently in the headlines for their so-called marriage plans.

American actor and musician Will Smith will also attend the event and entertain his fans in India.

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Mandira to play 'Deal Ya No Deal' with dabbawalas

After railway porters, traffic policemen and auto rickshaw drivers, Sony TV's game show "Deal Ya No Deal" has invited Mumbai's famous 'dabbawalas' to play the game with Mandira Bedi.

Sudhir Dabbawala will play the game and his 22 colleagues will enjoy the fun and thrills as part of the audience at 9 p.m. Feb 24.

The dabbawalas are members of the labour-intensive firm called Nutan Mumbai Tiffin Box Suppliers Association. Around 5,000 semi-literate people work with this group to transport 175,000 lunch boxes in a three-hour period every day.

They use public transportation over 25 km and the process involves multiple transfer points at a high level of quality.

The dabbawalas even impressed Prince Charles with their innocence and commitment to work. This time round, they will please Indian viewers on the game show.

The second series of "Deal Ya No Deal" with Mandira has given the show greater interactivity and made it a complete reality game show.

The show will continue with its simple and easy format. No difficult questions, no muscle power, only one mantra - Deal Ya No Deal.

'Mughal-e-Azam' to wow Pakistani audiences

Forty-five years after it became one of the biggest blockbusters of Indian cinema, the classic "Mughal-e-Azam" is set to dazzle audiences in Pakistan with censors clearing the film for screening.

The coloured version of "Mughal-e-Azam" that introduced the movie to a whole new generation of moviegoers in 2004 is the one that will be screened in Pakistan sometime in April-May.

With the Central Board of Film Censors clearing the movie Saturday, "Mughal-e-Azam" will be only the fourth Indian movie to be screened in Pakistan. The members of the board viewed the movie twice and decided to pass it without any cuts.

But officials have made it clear that the clearance of the epic was only a one-time waiver and the ban on Indian films would remain.

Director K. Asif's magnum opus "Mughal-e-Azam", which deals with the forbidden love between Mughal Emperor Akbar's son Prince Salim and the courtesan Anarkali, had a long and turbulent production history.

Asif began work on the film in 1944 but its lead actor died two years later and its financier Shiraz Ali then shifted to Pakistan after the Indian subcontinent was partitioned in 1947.

The director resumed work in 1951 with the new cast featuring Dilip Kumar and Madhubala, and then decided in 1959 to re-shoot it in colour. But film distributors lost patience and Asif went on to release it with only a few colour sequences.

In 2004, the full film was digitally coloured and given a Dolby surround soundtrack.

In Pakistan, the film will be distributed by Mandviwalla Entertainment Pvt Ltd of Karachi, a leading distribution firm.

Indian films have been banned in Pakistan since the 1965 war between them. Since then, the only Indian films cleared by the Pakistani censors were "Noor Jehan" (in 1981), "Kashish" (in 1982) and "Sohni Mahiwal" (in 2006).

Akbar Asif, the son of director Asif, had also presented a copy of "Mughal-e-Azam" to President Pervez Musharraf in December 2004 as a gift.

Recent reports have also suggested that the Indian film "Taj Mahal", which stars Pakistani actress Sonia Jehan, the granddaughter of singer Noor Jehan, might also be cleared for screening in the country.

Will Lajmi's 'Chingaari' finally strike a chord?

Filmmaker Kalpana Lajmi, known for making women-oriented films, has now come up with the poignant tale of a prostitute.

The film releasing Friday is about the plight of a sex worker who finally raises her voice against the exploiters.

"Chingaari", based on a short story by veteran Assamese singer and music director Bhupen Hazarika, revolves around three characters - a young postman, a sex worker and a village priest.

The young postman, Chandan Mishra played by Anuj Sawhney, is a crusader of sorts while Sushmita plays Basanti, the sex worker. The turning point in Basanti's life comes when she gains the respect of Chandan. But she is not allowed to even dream of a relationship with him.

Mithun Chakraborty plays Bhuvan Panda, the village priest who secretly lusts for Basanti. But Basanti revolts and the film's title "Chingaari" is drawn from this spark of revolt.

The climax of the film sees the exploited Basanti rising like a goddess and unleashing a fury to crush the exploiters and their dual standards.

Armed with a trident, she embodies the fury of the gods and rips open the façade of those who preach spirituality but practice vice.

Lajmi first offered the powerful role to Bipasha Basu, Raveena Tandon and Preity Zinta. When they turned it down, she approached Sushmita.

The male lead was also offered to several top-notch actors like Akshay Kumar, Akshaye Khanna and Tusshar Kapoor. But none was willing to don the greasepaint for the soft, romantic character. So Kalpana settled for the lesser-known Anuj.

A slight rift was created between the director and the actress by leaks about a kissing scene. But the storm blew over as Lajmi sorted things out with Sushmita.

Lajmi's fans had been hugely disappointed by her poor craftsmanship in "Daman" and "Kyon?"

"Daman", which came in 2001, was the feeble tale of a suppressed woman where Raveena played the role of the exploited wife. But the film failed to offer any solutions to violence against women.

This was followed by "Kyon?" in 2003, which was also a disappointment. One hopes "Chingaari" has something better to offer.

See Movie Stills from 'Chingaari'! Click HERE

Dominican Republic woos Indian film producers

Dominican Republic is seeking to woo Indian investment in IT and film producers to shoot in the Caribbean nation's picturesque locales.

As a measure of its growing interest in India, it is even planning to open an embassy here.

The republic's foreign minister, Carlos Morales Troncoso, will be here for a week from Thursday in the first high-level visit from the tiny nation of nine million that bridges the Caribbean and Central American regions.

Troncoso will meet Minister of State for External Affairs Anand Sharma and discuss bilateral ties. An agreement on bilateral cooperation will be signed between the two ministers, an external affairs ministry release said.

A 25-member delegation including the education and IT ministers, as also a 10-member business delegation, will accompany Troncoso.

The delegation will visit also Bangalore and Hyderabad for meetings with Indian industrialists.

"There is scope for significant increase in the bilateral trade," the ministry release said. India's exports to Dominican Republic in 2004-2005 stood at $20 million while imports amounted to $2 million.

Now Switzerland goes gaga over Bollywood

Bollywood films are growing in popularity in Switzerland with Aamir Khan's "Rang de Basanti" being the latest to draw rave reviews and audience applause.

"We had to wait long till once again a film from Aamir Khan, the star from 'Lagaan', comes to our cinema," said Zuritipp, the cultural news supplement of Zurich's largest selling German language daily Tages Anzeiger.

The film has been accorded three stars in the movie section of 20 Minutes, a tabloid circulated free in trams, buses and trains. This rating puts it on a par with such Hollywood flicks as "Memories of a Geisha" and "Oliver Twist".

Aamir Khan is hugely popular in Switzerland since the "Lagaan" days, during the screening of which he had made an appearance at the Arthouse cinema, on his way back from the Locarno film festival.

Download Kal Ho Naa Ho WallpapersShah Rukh Khan is also widely recognised and his "Paheli" last year was feted with four stars by 20 Minutes, a rare acclaim accorded to only few Hollywood, German, or Swiss films. His other films "Kal Ho Na Ho", "Main Hoon Na" and "Devdas" also stirred frenzied responses.

The "India Everywhere" tagline of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII)-sponsored events at the recent World Economic Forum summit in Davos seems to have livened up the streets of Switzerland as one encounters Aishwarya Rai posters in Longines watch ads and Bollywood movie posters.

Surely Bollywood has arrived in Switzerland, enjoying wide popularity, in a trend that goes beyond just a passing fad. The trend is here to stay as many people seem to see Bollywood as an alternative to Hollywood.

Download Lagaan Wallpapers"The Swiss want more and more Indian films," said an employee at a cinema about Indian films that are shown in Hindi with German subtitles.

With the increasing popularity of Hindi films, the songs are also creating a fad. Major music stores like Music Hug are flooded with CDs of Hindi film music. There was a time when such music was available only in pirated versions in Pakistani stores for the home-sick diaspora from the sub-continent. Now the most upmarket video stores are dishing out CDs of Indian films in slick packages to the Swiss public.

What is it that appeals to the Swiss people about Hindi films?

A Hindi movie enthusiast, Daniel Meier, said: "Oh, these actresses are so beautiful!"

As for the growing popularity of these films among young women, he said: "How much our women would love to have a man in a typical Bollywood film who loves his woman so much and is not fixated on football and going out for beer with his male peers."

Nicole Sieber, a high school teacher, said: "It's amazing how much they can pack into one film - glamour, dance, moral values, history, emotions."

Sieber, who finished her studies in English literature recently from the university of Zurich, said she had a group of about 8-10 classmates who were all crazy about dancing to Bollywood tunes, besides watching the films.

Yolanda, a student at the University of Zurich, says she likes only films showing traditional Indians.

Switzerland seems to be repaying to Bollywood the popularity it has received as a site for shooting of so many films.

In the summer of 2002, the university held an exhibition titled, "Bollywood and Switzerland". At the inauguration ceremony, Bollywood filmmaker Yash Chopra was honoured for his trend-setting work using Switzerland as the locale for countless dream, dance and honeymoon sequences in his films.

Download Veer Zaara WallpapersThe Swiss tourism industry is grateful to Chopra and other Bollywood directors for popularising the country among Indian tourists, who make up one of the largest tourist groups.

The craze seems to have spilled over to neighbouring Germany as well, where the popular TV channel RTL beams Bollywood blockbusters dubbed in German at prime time. Viewers can download ringtones of different Hindi songs on their mobile phones for three euros per downloading.

The films shown repeatedly include "Kuch Kuch Hota Hai", "Veer-Zaara", "Taal" and "Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam".

Music has no boundaries: Ghulam Ali

Kozhikode, Feb 12:
Stating that music has no boundaries, globe trotting ghazal maestro Ghulam Ali today said that it could play an important role in easing tension between India and Pakistan and pave way for lasting peace.

Talking to reporters, prior to the start of his programme ‘’Ghazal Ke Mehfil,’’ on the concluding day of the Tenth ‘Malabar Mahotsav’ here, he said it was easy to achieve peace through music as the people in the sub-continent spoke the same language and were familiar with the same ragas.
The singing sensation from Pakistan said he believed in purity in ghazal. Fusion laced with ghazal would destroy classical music, he opined.
Ghulam Ali, who got his initial musical training from his father and also trained briefly under the legendary Ustad Bade Gulam Ali Khan said he would be happy to conduct ghazals in Malayalam if he got an opportunity.

Ali, who first sang for Lahore radio in 1960, has his works etched in many languages, including Urdu and Hindi. His compositions include ‘Hungama hai kyon barpa,’ ‘Dil mein ek lahar si uthi hai abhi,’ ‘Mehfil mein baar baar usi par nazar gayeen,’ ‘Kal Chaudavin ki raat thi,’ to name a few.
Ali, the most influential amabassador from across the border, who, sang ‘’Faasle aise bhi honge, yeh kabhi socha na tha’’is considered to have brought ghazal from both the countries closer to each other. UNI

The Man, his Music & Mantra

Chandigarh, February 12:
The band has increased its volume. From six, they are a line-up of eleven now, including three girls. The state is still exalted, but the sounds have turned mellower, maturer. And Dr Palash ‘Polly’ Sen has successfully graduated to a complete maniac — at least when it comes to his first love, something he’s been associated with for eight years and something that has been in his family for four generations now (his son Kinshuk has joined in too) — music. ‘‘Precisely the reason I don’t do films. You get stuck in the long process. I look for instant gratification, and music gives me that,’’ he shoots, slightly restless with the concert time running out and rest of the members on stage for the sound check at the PEC Fest. ‘‘Moreover, I never got an offer as good as Filhaal again,’’ says this cerebral singer who coined the term ‘Hindrock’ for ‘‘journalists who kept pestering him with what is your style of music.’’ ‘‘It’s rock, and it’s in Hindi. So there it goes — Hindrock,’’ Polly grins, all set to release their next album, Mehfuz this month.

Evidently excited about it, Palash, at the same time is fiercely possessive about Indian music and considers it a huge compliment to play for an Indian audience. ‘‘The music explosion has seen Pak bands rushing in like crazy, and the sad thing is that there is no reciprocal effect to it. These guys are eating up our identity, and we are watching like fools. I feel this entire hospitality business is a farce. Instead we should be promoting our own talent,’’ Polly makes all the sense adding how the Indian music industry is still stuck in a ‘‘retro format.’’ ‘‘Music remains the Number One mode of entertainment, a publicity vehicle for every film. The only way we can boost this industry is with corporate backing.’’ The doc’s got the right diagnosis! ‘‘I think it’s the coolest to be a doctor,’’ Palash sticks to identity number one, and to a no playback too. ‘‘How can you sing to somebody else’s words and music. For an expression to be personal, you need to write and compose on your own. We have made our place and I never want to lose that,’’ the big boss of the band proclaims. ‘‘I guess someone has to be in the lead and take control,’’ winks the ‘Sultan of SMS’. ‘‘Nah, I am just a simple person and I maintain that.’’ Which is why our guy avoids preaching. ‘‘We have a message in every song, and total quality control too. If you like it, follow it.’’ We already are doc.

Treading the hard path to success

Music composer Ismail Darbar tells about his struggles and much more to Madhur Tankha...

There are no shortcuts to taste success. And no one knows it better than music composer Ismail Darbar, who is revered for his thought-provoking and sensitive compositions. Having struggled hard for over a decade in the big, bad world of Bollywood before one of the finest Hindi film directors took note of his inborn artistic talent to infuse life into meaningless songs, he knows what success really means.

In the Capital on Saturday to judge a musical competition "Hero Honda Surtarang National Singing Talent Hunt", Ismail said he was elated to have arrived in New Delhi. "Dilli genuinely belongs to big-hearted people. It was here that the prestigious National Award was conferred on me for my debut film `Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam'. The city has been lucky for me as it is difficult and unimaginable for an upcoming composer to bag such an important award and that too for his first film. However, first and foremost I am thankful to the Almighty for showering his blessings on me."

On his little known background, Ismail said he hails from Surat, a city in Gujarat. "Surat has given Bollywood three immensely talented artistes. It has produced one of the best Hindi film actors Sanjeev Kumar and also the legendary Mehboob Khan who directed `Mother India'. Thirdly, it produced me. In Mumbai I learnt Western classical music from Ramprasad Sharma. But Hindustani classical music was in my blood as before me all the three generations of my family were into this wonderful music. My father, Hussain Sahib, played saxophone and clarinet. Western classical instruments were also played by my grandfather and great grandfather," he said.

Asked how he managed to get a break in acclaimed film director Sanjay Leela Bhansali's magnum opus "Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam", Ismail's eyes lit up and a smile crossed his countenance. "After playing violin for 21 years, I took the decision to become a music composer. It was Kunal Ganjawala who gave my name to Sanjay. In our first meeting at his house, I sang the song `Tadap Tadap'. It took Sanjay six months before he decided to sign me on for the film. He is truly one of our best directors. I say this not because Sanjay is my friend or because he gave me a break but because he has done the whole Hindustan proud through his brilliant cinema." Ismail is gung-ho about his upcoming film "Pyaar Kiya To Nibhana" in which he has got a golden opportunity to make Lata Manageshkar sing. "Though Lataji is 77-years-old yet she works with energy and enthusiasm of a 17-year-old. After I sang the song to make Lataji understand the nuances, she practiced the song till 2 a.m. in the morning and even skipped lunch to dub the song." Expressing happiness that musical programme "Sa Re Ga Ma Pa" on Zee TV was giving a platform to a number of budding singers, Ismail said sometimes it disturbs him to see that teenagers were making such painstaking efforts to make a mark in the industry. "It should not be forgotten that the contestants have been away from their homes for the past eight months and have even temporarily discontinued their studies," he said.

About the glamour element introduced in the programme, Ismail said it was necessary to create interest among those who do not give importance to songs. "Even channels have to recover their cost. They provide food, accommodation and all types of comforts to the contestants that too in a place like Mumbai. Naturally, a little glamour element is necessary."

In unreleased "Mehbooba" Ismail has got a chance to work with Sanjay Dutt. Ismail said that despite being son of the late Sunil Dutt and a big star, Sanjay is a down-to-earth person. "He knows the importance of sharing a personal bond with the actors."

Even though his contemporary Himesh Reshammiya is making waves by belting out popular chartbusters like "Aashiq Banaya Aapne", Ismail is content sticking to his own field. Ruling out singing songs, he said: "I only sing when I have to make the film director and singer understand the nuances of the song. The day I feel that a particular song can be best sung by me alone I would certainly do it. A person has to bear out his soul while singing. If he is a sensitive, warm human being then it reflects in his song."