Similar to the first person narrative feature of his directorial debut, ‘Kuch Kuch Hota Hai’, MNIK is a story heard through the tongue of the Asperger’s afflicted Rizwan Khan, who journeys across half the world and then through the breadth of another continent, to say as we’ve all heard or read somewhere, “My name is Khan, and I am not a terrorist”. After watching the uninspiring trailers, and the edited overly precious shots of Shahrukh playing Khan, I did not walk into the cinemas expecting much from this seemingly gimmicky film. I walked out surprised though, and pleasantly for the most part. In a polarized world, where the line of demarcation is clearly becoming religion even over race, the intent of MNIK is noble. To its credit, unlike the also well intentioned ‘Delhi 6’ last year, this film manages to build on its premise more effectively. In a nutshell, the story is in the form of a question: Are the world and its inhabitants so far gone that you are not allowed an individual persona that may be separate from your religious affiliations?

My Name is Khan has many stories, and many Khans, in spite of what the titular protagonist may have you believing. There is Raziya Khan, the mother who brought up her son believing in him with faith and pride, and ignored the rest of the world as she single handedly taught him all that is right and just, even till her death. There is Zakir Khan, the underappreciated but well loved younger brother, and Haseena Khan, his college professor wife, who are traditionalist Muslims but loyal family. There are Mandira and Sameer Khan, the mother and son who find place in their lives for another, who seek love and happiness and the feeling of home. And there are the thousands of unnamed people, who in brief moments of time, Johar introduces us too, if only to show us the impact this Khan has on them. Independently, most of these stories, and most of these people, are interesting, but together, in this ambitious screenplay written by Shibani Bathija, none of the stories develop to real fruition.

I like to start with attributes, and this film has those in abundance. Like I’ve said multiple times before, the biggest success of this film is its intention. It’s pure and it’s refreshing. The casting is unusual for a Johar film (aside from the lead pair of course), and most of the supporting cast does a fine job. Zarina Wahab, a departure from the Kirron Kher and Jaya Bachchan mould of Dharma Production mothers is very effective in her enthusiasm and both authentic and endearing in her manner. Jimmy Shergill is amongst the most underachieving of contemporary Indian actors (he was apparently a de facto choice after the actor originally cast for the film was denied a visa), and even though this isn’t his shining moment, he clearly needs to find a film where he can shine. Navneet Nishan is the cliché of the horny old woman/man Johar enjoys injecting into his film. The clear standout though, is Sonya Jehan. It took me a while to place her as the actress who started out her career as the lead in ‘Taj Mahal’, but she is stunning, and a very gifted actor. Even in the few scenes that she had in the film, she will hopefully catch the eye of someone with a good script and a good role, ‘cause she has the looks and the acting chops, and deserves a shot.

The music of the film is the better of the two albums Shankar Ehsaan Loy have scored this year so far, and the tracks Noor-e-Khuda and Sajda and even Tere Naina are fantastic. One huge plus for the film, and this in fact pushes the film up an entire letter grade in my book, is the fantastic cinematography. Ravi K Chandran is nothing short of brilliant as he captures a panoramic view of the United States, especially in the scene at the point of intermission in the Arizona desert, and even in more intimate moments, such as the scene in the song Tere Naina, whilst Kajol gives Khan a haircut, he uses natural light so effectively that it leaves you stunned. The look of the film also, is suitably opulent without being jarring, in typical style for a Dharma film, and Kajol looks her best in years.

Of the leads, Kajol is good. Scratch that, she’s awesome in the material she’s been given, and in my personal opinion, after the crazy awesome turn she did in ‘Dushman’, this is perhaps her most accomplished performance. BUT…more on that later. The film of course, unequivocally belongs to Khan. Shahrukh Khan has been called many things, but more often than not, a standout actor he is not. For so many years he has defined the term star, and despite his many popular awards for Best Actor, apart from ‘Chak de India’, there is hardly another movie you could cite in which he was more an actor than a star (‘Swades’ was an awful bore for me, sorry!). In this film though, which I suspect was written specifically for him, he has the time and the meat to bite whole heartedly into a game changing role, and for the most part, passes brilliantly. He has a naturally intelligent sense of humour that he lends to his character and despite some of the cheesy lines that may put you off in the previews this is an authentic, effective portrayal of a highly developed autist. Not even he can help pass this off as a masterpiece though.

The film has many flaws, and quite frankly, they overwhelm the film towards the climax. And that is very disheartening actually, because one hour, and an intermission later, I actually thought it was turning out to be just brilliant. Whilst walking out of the cinema, I tried to figure out what changed in the second half. Perhaps it is a problem only I face, but dialogue, IMHO, is the crux of any film. It is what layers an idea into a screenplay, and what distinguishes achievement from ambition. Like I’ve said before, this script has ambition aplenty, but somewhere along the way, and it is my belief that it happened whilst penning the dialogues, it veers away from living up to its potential. There are moments in the film where Johar and his collaborators could have perhaps opted for silence but instead choose to go for dramatic emphasis. It is the single threads of wool that make the quilt warm though, and in this particular case, just as you start to feel toasty, it shrinks to nothing. Also, unbelievably disappointing was the way they wrote bits of Kajol’s character and the initial interaction between her and Khan. Her opening scene and the terrible dialogue made you cringe at best, and then the constant fixture of Khan, a travelling salesman in her salon was inexplicable. There are two points on which I am going to elaborate here. A) The premise of Khan’s journey, whilst interesting, and some of his moments on the road, such as his meeting the motel owner played by Vinay Pathak, agreeably insightful, there is such a thing as too much. By the end of the film, the only good deed Khan had not done was blowing away Hurricane Katrina with the power of his breath, and honestly, I feel sure that Bathija at least considered giving him the Nobel Peace Prize. To go from entertaining to arduous in twenty minutes is a lesson to be learned from this screenplay. B) The crisis in the film, once again, seemed so juicy to Johar and his associates, that they gave it not just one harrowing scene but two. Whilst the first was passable, if only because of Kajol’s natural talent, the second was just overkill. It was loud, obnoxious, unreal and odious. What should have been a pivotal moment became a terribly overacted sham.

These may seem like a lot of shortcomings, but in truth and in all honesty, these are all of them. And since I’m being honest, they are far fewer than I thought they would be. And at the point of the interval, I couldn’t remove the plastered smile off my face, even if I tried. Whilst the second half may have been a tremendous letdown to the buildup of the first, it wasn’t all bad, and in a hackneyed sort of way, Johar does somehow get his message out. And it is a message that needs to be out. This may not be the best film Johar has made (‘KKHH’ will retain that for some time to come), but it is, at the very least far better than any other film to come out of his direction (and I’m counting the awful ‘Kal Ho Naa Ho’ in that mix). Watch it, if only once, if only for Shahrukh Khan and Kajol together on screen, if only for the beautiful landscape of the US through RKC’s lens, or if only because not every Khan is a terrorist.

In this deeply dissatisfying scenario, Vishal Bhardwaj has time and again brought us entertainment that is rooted in the ethos of Indian-ness. Whether it was Makdee or Maqbool, Omkara or Kaminey, Bhardwaj went from Uttar Pradesh to Bihar to Maharashtra to West Bengal and fleshed out characters that are real, relatable, and more than anything else, incredibly entertaining. Perhaps that is why, from being an underfinanced independent filmmaker, he now stands in a position to have his own production company, supporting fledgling newcomers like Abhishek Chaubey make cinema of the newest brand, which for a better term, I’m going to call Bhardwaj-esque.

Ishqiya is a prime example of cinema that brings back the feeling of the cinema of Shyam Benegal or Gulzar, but is emphatic in its purpose being, like all other movies under the Bhardwaj banner, unadulterated entertainment. Headlined by Vidya Balan, Naseeruddin Shah and Arshad Warsi, it takes us on a ride from Bhopal to Gorakhpur to Faizabad and back, and introduces us to characters as nutty as Iftiqar(Shah)and Babban(Warsi) and as layered as Krishna(Balan).

The story of Ishqiya is simple enough, albeit a little indulgent to plot points. Babban and Iftiqar are on the run from a goon named Mushtaq and they run into the widow of Vidyadhar Verma, Krishna. What happens next is a delicious continuum of twists and turns, some that make you sit up and some that make you dizzy. The movie has everything that a caper film in the ilk of Kaminey needs, but instead treads a delicate balance between an unconventional romance and a tribute to noir. The duo solicit the help of Krishna and construct a plan to get out of a potentially life threatening debt and at the same time, earn enough to retire to a life of luxury. Are there mixed motives though? Or do, per usual, the best laid plan of mice and men, go askew? This is what follows in the meandering journey these three unlikely accomplices take.

The treatment is what makes this film special. Like all films before this, Bhardwaj pays incredible attention to detail in his dialogues, and they’re appropriately crass, whilst remaining effectively authentic. He gets the dainty Balan to mouth words you’d think she didn’t know the meaning of with such consummate ease that you get effortlessly sucked into the world where gang wars are treated like real wars and children of different castes are initialized into weaponry at (Bhardwaj uses colorful language to describe this) the age of potty training. There is more than a touch of humor in the movie, and most of it is induced by the dialogue and its delivery, both of which are impeccable. I’ve read that the film was shot on set in suburban Bombay, and in that case, the set decorator and the DOP deserve special plaudits for very efficiently creating the required ambience to take us back to the days of ‘Ankur’ and ‘Mrityudand’.

As he has grown with his direction, so Bhardwaj has improved his musical scoring. Amongst the only composers left to rely solely on traditional Indian melody, he creates a score that is rich, textured, perfectly fitting and that creates a mood that elevates this already very good film quite a few notches. The positioning of each song also is done immaculately, and Chaubey does a particularly fantastic job of interweaving the music with the flow of the story, and also for directing the song sequences themselves, so that at no point do they take away from the movie.

The trump card of Ishqiya however, is its characters. A special shout out must go to the casting director who does a spectacular job of casting each and every role, such that the parts seem like they were written for the actors playing them, even though you’ve never seen any of them do anything remotely similar. Shah is potent as usual, and shows innocence, despondence, vulnerability and charm as well as he ever has. Warsi finds a role for the first time since the memorable Circuit in the Munnabhai franchise that suits him to a T, and he grabs on to it with both hands. He treads the path of too much in a few scenes, but is just about perfect for the role, and does complete justice. Amongst the supporting cast, the child actor playing Nandu has only a couple of scenes, but is precocious without being annoying and is the standout in the supporting cast. The film however unequivocally belongs to Vidya Balan.

Krishna is at times a victimized widow and at times a wily nymphet, and Balan transforms with just the tiniest shift in expression, or the most insignificant gesture, from one to another that her performance in this film could actually be studied in film school. She is clearly out of her regular style of work (as evidenced by her previous films) but carves out a character that is so real and oozes with sensuality that she ends up being irresistible. This film was probably shot before Paa, and Balan still carries some of the weight she had lost for Paa, but in the saris she wears, she has never looked as hot as she does in this film. Even though they look nothing alike, she manages in this film to bring back the memories of the raw sensuality of Smita Patil, and she clearly has the acting prowess to match as well. Undeniably the most powerful female character in cinema since Shabana Azmi in Godmother, this is (IMHO) the best performance by an actress in years, and if Balan does not get her due for this film, she probably never will, because this is one hard act to follow. She is the heart and soul of this film, and rightly so.

All Bhardwaj films have genius titles, and this film isn’t any different, and what is more, it is very fitting. The film is all about Ishqiya, and as corny as it sounds, it won’t be odd if many of you feel the ishq or crush long after you’ve left the cinema.

Gervais needs to be commended for his inventiveness. Taking the basest of human instinct and creating an alternate reality around it, Gervais weaves a story that is unmistakably original and potentially brilliant. Especially in such story though, how you execute each scene increases exponentially in importance. Somehow, Gervais misses the play there, and what results is a long experience of tedium. It isn’t that he doesn’t try, in all earnestness, to form a complete story, it’s just that he doesn’t have that much of a plot, and his meandering through the mess of Bellison’s life to find one is an arduous watch.

In this world of Gervais’ creation, of course, there can be no Church, no concept of science, because everything just is. There isn’t even a word for truth or lies, because there isn’t a distinction. Everything you say, is, or, like Bellison says, his power is to “say something that wasn’t.” Instead of examining the implications of the lack of such fundamental institutions as religion and reasoning, Gervais chooses to go the rom-com route and study the ramifications of the lack of free will. This he translates to a lack of feeling and automated reasoned decision making, and a painfully oft-repeated “search for a genetic match.”

Jennifer Garner is brazen and brave for trying to flesh out a character, but with a paper thin character sketch, does nothing significant. Gervais has a fantastic role to play with, but really, and maybe it’s just me, he’s so inherently unlikable that it is difficult for anyone to root for him. There are a bunch of interesting cameos thrown in there as well, from the likes of Jason Bateman and Tina Fey, but none really hit home. There is a lack of sincerity, or perhaps of identification, and instead of being honest, they come across as mean and unlikable.

Also, I think, perhaps for comic effect, Gervais not only makes it impossible for anyone to lie, but also to contain thoughts, and everyone is sharing what they’re doing, or thinking, and whilst highly comical in theory, for the duration of the 100 odd minutes this picture lasts, can become quite an ordeal. In essence, I would say, that whilst this is just me and my sheer inability to enjoy the humour of Gervais (I’m amongst the very few who enjoy the American adaptation of The Office infinitely more than the British one), The Invention of Lying just wasn’t smart enough to not need it to be hilarious. Not every comedy gives you a stitch in your side, but it’s rare that you find yourself cringing more often than smiling, and when that happens, you know you’re watching the wrong movie.

Headlining the proceedings is Siddharth Mehra, a twenty something almost graduate who goes from Mr. Popular to the “one who flunked out” in a commerce college in Bombay. As is typical with such stories, Sid, the titular protagonist is affluent, spoiled and sleepwalking through life hanging on to the coat-tails of his father’s wealth. Again, typically, he may be flawed, embarrassed at associating himself with “flower showers”, his father’s legacy that he so easily uses for his material needs, but at the core, has a good heart. He is detached and unwilling to commit though, either to relationships (as is evident in both his dealings with his parents and his advice to his about-to-propose friend) or to work, and, in his own words, “just want(s) to have fun”.

In stark contrast to Sid is the pivotal character of Aisha. She’s the “new girl in the city”, she’s driven, already lined up a job interview, and bold and brazen enough to go on a late night walk in a strange city with a guy she just met at a party. She is traditional though, and immediately clarifies that she “doesn’t want to sleep with (Sid)”. This highlights the relationship between the two throughout the film, with Aisha motivating Sid to be all he can, without ever telling him he must.

The beauty of Wake Up Sid truly comes from the well crafted characters and the natural, fluid dialogue between them. They say that life is made up of millions of small moments. The same is true of cinema, and every film comes together as a series of interchanges between characters. Unfortunately, most films seem to miss this point, and get lost in translation. Ayan Mukherjee and Niranjan Iyengar do a surprisingly good job of writing the screenplay and especially dialogues, especially a standout angry exchange between Ranbir Kapoor, Anupam Kher and Supriya Pathak. Every teenager who at some time found themselves drifting and couldn’t bring themselves to care will relate with Sid, his frustration, his unspeakable regret and his wrathful outburst.

In terms of performances, everyone is at the top of their games, with Konkona Sen being an obvious best. Supriya Pathak and Anupam Kher are also brilliant, in roles so well played out, that you often forget that it’s a scripted drama. The music by Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy, and more specifically the background score and the track Iktara, both composed by Amit Trivedi, are enjoyable and help greatly with the flow of the film.

The movie is not without faults of course. Ranbir Kapoor, in perhaps the most well suited role of his career, for the most part, does a fantastic job of being the very likable vagabond. In some scenes however, especially of a more serious tone, he does tend to be a little too earnest. In addition, Mukherjee tends to resort to plot clichés to further the story more often than necessary. Finally, the biggest letdown came in the form of the only article written by Aisha that we get to hear. Not only is it impertinent to her column name, but following the build up, it is very disheartening to be given only a crushing RJ’s sermon when we expect a writer’s epiphany. If God is in the details, Mukherjee loses several opportunities to make the movie a beacon, satisfied instead with standard cinematic cop-outs.

In a climate of unoriginal plots and recycled characters however, Wake Up Sid is worth watching, maybe even renting for a second viewing. Full of hope, optimism, and a sheer feel good feeling, it makes you want to be young again. It makes you want to walk in the rain, click photographs in Chor Bazaar, trade your mundane job for a day at Mumbai Beat, but most importantly, it makes you want to, especially for Bombay natives, find a moment to enjoy just being.

Chance pe Dance is the third collaboration between actor Shahid Kapoor and director Ken Ghosh. And much like Ishq Vishq and Fida before this, Kapoor is almost the only good thing in the movie. Almost. The fresh faced Genelia D’Souza thankfully replaced Jiah Khan and, in my opinion, is the only reason I enjoyed Chance Pe Dance more than Ghosh’s earlier two films.

The story is one you’ve heard before, most recently in the 2009 release Luck by Chance. Kapoor plays a struggling actor who travelled from Delhi to Bombay to become a hero, because, well, everyone from his birth thought he should be. Not the film industry though. Much like the thousands who come here every year, Sameer Behl (Kapoor) goes from audition to audition, most often getting passed over by a less talented but better connected pretender. Eventually though, the contender gets his due (obviously), and we spend two predictable hours finding out how. Sonia Sharma (D’Souza) is a budding choreographer who crosses paths with him over and over, becoming his life coach and girlfriend in this milieu.

To his credit, Ghosh keeps the story light, with no unnecessary emotional drama. Sameer has a good relationship with his father despite his career choice, he never faces too bad a scrap, and even when the going really bad, he doesn’t forget to wear his designer glasses or his smile. The humor, scattered generously through the film, isn’t particularly intelligent, but then, neither are the characters, and the sheer likability of the two leads helps you wade through it, relatively dry. Another positive in this film was the way Ghosh has chosen to shoot his non-dance songs, two in particular. In the track Rishta Hai Mera, he shows the aspirations and ambitions of the characters by making them larger than life, using digital imagery to make them sit on bridges and walk taller than buildings. Whether this device has been used before I cannot say, but in this track I felt it worked really well. Also, in the romantic number Pal Mein Hi, he uses a warm yellow filter which I feel added a certain ambience without being overbearing as in Ram Gopal Verma “blue” films.

The film is far from perfect though. Kapoor has always been one of the best dancers in the Indian film industry, having trained and instructed under Shaimak Davar, and this is the first dance film that he has made. It is a wonder then that the actor was satisfied with this film as his first out-and-out display of his immense talent on the dance floor. Despite the posters of Michael Jackson, So You Think You Can Dance and Chicago that adorn his walls throughout the movie, there is barely a glimmer of great dance. Even for D’Souza, who is supposed to be the choreographer, neither is the opening sequence jaw dropping nor is anything else. What was most distracting though, was the terrible, angle shifting and frame cutting that is used in almost all the dance sequences, including the one at an inter school dance competition. None of it was worthy of a dance movie.

Most of the first half was a drag, because while well conceived (if that were possible in the clichéd setup, that is), it was very loosely written and not engaging. The dance numbers were few, far between, and far away from being fierce or fiery. The music, whilst not annoying, lacked a certain punch. There was a moment, about five minutes before the interval though, that the situation came to a boil, and one could almost smell a satisfying second half. No such luck though, as the crisis that we anticipated an entertaining solution to, resolved itself too soon. And so Ghosh thought it was wise to add more twists and turns at breakneck speed, until you just want it to end. There is not a worse scene than Behl’s final acting audition though, and it was at that point that I think the film slipped half a grade point in my mind.

What struck me the most though, was that, even though Behl complains about his being overlooked and all the other sad things in life (a scene I thought, by the way, Kapoor performed remarkably well), there’s a scene towards the end, where his father, sitting in faraway Delhi, can’t switch a channel without his son being on it. There could’ve been a less subtle way to bring him to his destiny I suppose, and am therefore just glad that Ghosh did not know of it.

To be completely fair, I think Chance Pe Dance is not without merit. It struck me as a better film than Luck by Chance, and could’ve even been in the league of Jab We Met had it been handled better. Of the leads, Genelia is cute, fits her role to a T, and perhaps would’ve been even more likable had she had a more substantial part. Shahid Kapoor does a very good turn as well, which is surprising, because in the trailers it seemed like he was hamming his way through the film. His hairstyle though, is another thing. Until the final scene in the film, where he finally gets them cropped, Kapoor is carrying forward the disastrous mop of Dil Bole Hadippa. So, would I recommend that people watch the movie? Yes, I think, mainly because it only promises to be a frothy romantic comedy, and does deliver in part on that. Is it fair to call it a dance movie? No, and that is my main problem with it. Like Aaja Nachle before this, the producers failed to work on their basic premise, which was to have great dance. With dancers in the league of Madhuri Dixit or Shahid Kapoor in this instance, and stories revolving around their dance, it seems criminal to shortchange them in the choreography department. Even the Dil Bole Hadippa mix was better choreographed. So if you’re looking for a desi Step Up, I would rather sit at home and watch an episode of Dance India Dance.