Eventful Marriage

Undercover agent Spencer Aimes (Ashton Kutcher) falls in love with a recently out-of-a-relationship Jen Kornfeldt (Katherine Heigl) who’s holidaying in Nice with her parents. Three years on, and to the blissful unawareness of Jen about her husband’s past, it takes a sudden attempt on Spencer’s life by what seemed to be a neighbor, to bring home the truth – Sepncer’s old organization wants him out. And dovetailing into this script is the family life of Spencer and Jen – with a baby on the way and a trust-no-one policy in respect of what they thought to be neighbors being potential Killers, the couple has an amusing whirlwind time and finally find peace with family – well, almost. An unusually good comedy that actually holds together quite nicely, and definitely recommended among the recent movies in its genre

12/20

Oh, Politics!

Adapted from the British comedy TV series The Thick of It, In the Loop features the UK Minister for International Development Simon Foster (Tom Hollander) making successive faux-pas in public office – first noting that war in Iraq is “unforseeable” (not quite the official line, for which he is duly berated), and then blurting out to journalists that he may need to “climb the mountain of conflict”. Out comes a summons to Washington, and Simon Foster soon becomes roadkill in a political game where the endgame was to take the countries – UK and USA - to war. When you are done with likes of The Green Zone and Body of Lies, watch this movie for a hilarious take on how UK (ostensibly) managed to bungle its way into the Iraq conflict. Exceptionally entertaining, as only the circus of politics can be

14/20

Bringing Kung Fu to Beijing

Within the genre of sports movies, no sports seem to be more evocative than football, and martial arts. While the former is about relentless pursuit of personal excellence coupled with teamwork, the latter is about technical brilliance honed to a startling degree at an individual level. When Dre Parker (Jaden Smith) makes his way to Beiging with single mom Sherry, leaving behind the wasteland of Detroit’s auto industry, he has to contend with physical aggression and hostility from his peer group. Enter Mr Han (Jackie Chan), the repairman with a history and no ordinary skills in kung fu. With training that encompasses chi, the art of learning through repetition, and a healthy dose on Chinese culture and values, The Karate Kid (2010) shows how a physically weak American kid uses kung fu (and not karate, which really is a serious turn-off) to find his way in his new world. Strictly a family entertainer, with action to entertain and truisms to ponder over

12/20

This Series Hereby Sleeps

Wall Street – Money Never Sleeps – has the tough task of measuring up to its legendary predecessor that was anchored by two extremely strong leads – Charlie Sheen (featured in the current movie in a cameo is a shockingly aged incarnation) and Michael Douglas (not quite his former self in this edition, as an out-of-prison Gordon Gekko). Lead Jake Moore (Shia LaBeouf) is a level-headed investment banker, with a reasonably modest existence (by IB standards of course) and a penchant for the ethical and for clean technology. Jake works through the meltdown and the collateral damage of looking to marry Gordon Gekko’s daughter – is Gekko now a changed man or the same marauder that he was in the 80’s? With strong overtones of the fall of Bear Stearns and the continued survival of the likes of Charles Schwab, this movie is a bit of a mishmash between high street finance parleys, and good old family values. Generally entertaining without being edge-of-the-seat, and marred by shoddy cinematography and editing in some degree, this is an entertaining movie but cannot hold even the merest hint of a candle to the original

11.5/20

To Err (repeatedly) is Human

Newly out of work Travis (Adrien Brody) finds himself volunteering for a paid experiment, with the promise of $ 1000/ day of compensation, for a period of 14 days. The study – to play the role of one of the prisoners as part of an experiment, wherein other volunteers, notably Barris (Forest Whittaker) act as the guards. In an experiment where the only restrictions on prisoners include never speaking to guards unless spoken to, and finishing all of their food, simple transgressions take an ugly turn as the prisoners led by Travis grapple with one diabetic in their midst, the uncertain food, et al, while the guards led by Barris take increasingly violent and regressive steps to address what they see as a growing challenge to their authority. In an experiment that would ostensibly terminate on the first hint of violence, much blood is shed before the same comes to an abrupt halt, and the movie trails off with a call to justice. With overtones of America’s reality of Guantanomo Bay, and movies such as Blindness, The Experiment shows just how degenerate a regular group of humans can become in a setting that has the slightest hint of an imbalance of power. A good movie that makes for some really heavy viewing

13.5/20

Please Go Away

There are movies that seem stuck in a time-warp – no matter how much times change, there does not seem to be any respite for the audience from the tearjerker content. When Kajol, Kareena, and Arjun Rampal start exploring the touchy topic of a broken family and new relationships, and the effects of the same on children, with the further angle of all of the said people being Indian diaspora, We Are Family seems to be a movie with a lot of promise. When Kajol gets detected with cancer, and the audience gets treated to a tsunami of melodrama, you are left with your head reeling from the senselessness of the portrayal and the sheer torment of the audience experience. This is a movie that takes on a topic of note, then goes out there and shoots itself. ‘nuff said

6.5/20

A Bit Incendiary, a Lot of fizz

Like the giant explosions in the second half of the movie, there are moments in Dabangg that are – well – explosive firsts in Hindi cinema in the action genre. What is not quite as catchy is the storyline, which gets caught in an uncertain zone between being the oh-so-familiar Bollywood melodrama, and being a loose vehicle for some over-the-top action sequences. With one-man action capers reminiscent of the likes of Desperado and Shoot ‘em Up, and liberal doses of inspiration from several other Hollywood flicks, this movie is on the one hand quite enough to be a popular hit, but could have gone much further in the over-the-top action genre. And then there is the issue of the never-ending careers of our Bollywood stars and whether it would have been really difficult to find a better lead than Salman Khan. In any case, watch this movie for the action, but you will not miss much if you snooze off whatever’s in between

10/20