Taran Adarsh does it again

Last Friday, I decided to go out for a film, and found Blue playing in a local theater. Looking online, I found a review that praised the film unequivocally, and thought it was worth checking out. After the film, I wanted to find out how anyone could praise such garbage and even call it a movie. Guess my surprise - I had missed reading the reviewer's name - it was a Taran Adarsh review. For those who don't know my relationship with Taran Adarsh's reviews, I refer you to the following posts - Bad Film Critic with Data and Bad Film Critic. 

Reading his review again, I could not stop rolling with laughter, and being mad at myself for not having checked earlier who wrote it.  He starts his review in his usual childish style (compare with his earlier review of Krissh):

Roll out the red carpet.
Blow the conch shells.
Beat the drums.
It's time to pop champagne...

Then he writes this classic line:

Let me keep it concise and to the point. You haven't watched something like this on the Hindi screen before. Never ever!

I couldn't agree more - it is so rare to see such garbage - I really don't think I have watched a worse film on the Hindi screen before.

He then writes, 

It requires courage, willpower, fortitude, vision and of course, the financial backing to accomplish a project of this magnitude.

Again, I couldn't agree more. It definitely requires great courage and willpower to go against even the bare minimum of common sense and good taste to make a film like this. One has to pay a lot of money to a lot of people to force them to come up with such garbage.

Final word? Go, grab a ticket, if you haven't booked one yet. This under-sea treasure hunt is a kickass film. A must-see for all those who love adventure flicks.

I feel like I got my ass kicked for sure. Out of great compassion for fellow cinema-goers, I give a heartfelt warning. If you must watch this, make sure you do so in a multiplex where you can get out and request the theater to watch another film.

Now, what's so bad about this film? First, it feels like someone threw money around like it grows on trees and got to film action sequences or song sequences wherever they liked. After they had these sequences, someone must have felt - lets write a script that sort of strings them together. As a formality, we find the characters telling us what the strings are, without a trace of conviction. Adarsh's comparison with National Geographic is ridiculous. Even National Geographic documentaries have a better script and storyline than this film. Akshay Kumar is fast slipping into the ranks of Salman Khan (in other words, he's going to be on my do-not-watch list unless some magic happens). 

That the director is a terrible one is clear from the way the film is shot. In a good film, we do not overdose on the heroes. When the hero interacts with others, you at least get to see the other person and there are dialogs which are mouthed by other small-role actors. That brings you in to the story. In a trashy film, the director does not bother to keep the camera on the side-actor for more than 100 microseconds, during which time the dialog delivery also happens. No expressions can be seen in such a short time, and one is left thinking that this is essentially an ego-trip for the actors involved. Such is the case with Blue, right from the first shot where Akshay Kumar and Sanjay Dutt battle a shark. We don't even get to see the other people on the boat and their expressions. Moreover, they are supposed to want to take the shark out to save the fish, but all the fish have escaped already. 

Flimsy excuses for every action sequence follows. Perhaps the worst insult to our intelligence is when Akshay Kumar jumps off his catamaran in a motorcycle, ostensibly to commit suicide but actually to escape, and how - in the sea bed, our man uses the air from motorcycle tyre to breathe and wait out a hurricane!!! This is after countless action sequences where our hero is more or less like a fish - does not require oxygen like other humans would.

The story is mostly told in the last five minutes of the film, and even here, it sounds concocted in a hurry with little regard for the audience's sensibility.

The only reason for watching this movie would be to give it the worst Hindi movie of the decade award. This one is definitely a finalist! The silver lining is that Taran Adarsh's reviews are so predictable that they can help us pick good films by doing the opposite of what he says.

# posted by Capital Socialist/Social Capitalist @ 1:48 PM