New to Milliblog? If you like what you read here, may I suggest subscribing to Milliblog's RSS feed or e-mail alerts?. Thanks for visiting!

Despite the musically-aware gang in Chennai going ga-ga over Keeravani’s music in Kshana kshanam, back in the 90s when it was more fashionable to trash Telugu music for being over-the-top, I personally cherish one particular Telugu film album and that is composer Sri’s Anaganaka Oka Roju (1997). This was a film started by one of Ram Gopal Varma’s assistant at that time, Krishna Vamsi and was taken over later, by the mentor himself. The music was top notch commercial potpourri.

The rhythmic, rock and roll tint of Love is blind and a completely disparate, almost nonsensical prelude in Endammo had me in raptures. After the prelude, Endammo had a fairly predictable tune but the bridge passages Sri cooks up to get back to the mukhda, along with the interludes, are very neat. Oopalenaya may sound very hackneyed now, but back in 1997, the convoluted tune and the laid-back orchestration that pauses every so often was both raw and innovative. This track also had Ilayaraja-like sax and chorus interludes that was bang-on as far as the situation goes. Aedo taha taha was the only weak link that was trademark Telugu music, combining middle-eastern traces in its orchestration.

But my personal favorite was O cheli. This track has a conversational tone and it was even more enjoyable on screen with Urmila and Chakravarthy having solid fun. The playful banter that opens the song so beautifully paves way to a scintillating first interlude in violin that teases us with what it doesn’t play - the silent pauses. A flute takes over and it goes into a medley of amazing sounds before it reaches a crescendo and back to the dialog. Mano (credited as Nagur Babu) and Chitra tune in incredible sync while rendering this track.

Mano actually sings all the 5 tracks and its really a pity that this talented singer was always considered second fiddle to the king, SP Balasubramaniam and perhaps never got his due. I looked forward to Sri’s music after this film, but he just seems to have fizzled out of circulation. We do have this soundtrack to remember him with, nevertheless.

Keywords: Chakravarthy, Urmila Matondkar, Ram Gopal Varma

Despite the temptation to sneak in questions of plagiarism, let us agree that Pritam is innocent, until proven otherwise. So, we have a scintillating latino-styled track sung with super verve by Javed Ali, sounding a bit like Abhijeet. But, Zubin sounds awkward in the remix. Aa dil se, despite the heavy-duty middle-eastern inclusions, peters into a noisy, forgettable track. Aye dil is definitely interesting, for its unusual, free-flowing structure and rapturous orchestration. Pritam pumps up the adrenaline appropriately in the theme piece, Disguised intentions. Not many tracks here and Ek din will remain Naqaab’s calling card.

Keywords: Akshaye Khanna, Abbas Mustan, Bobby Deol, Urvashi Sharma, Pritam Chakravarty

The instantly pleasing ambient sounds, exotic orchestration and luscious melodies in Akkam pakkam and Vizhiyil sound much like early-day Rahman but Kaneer is a serious letdown considering its a routine ‘pathos’ song we had forgotten! The composer and his tune go haywire in the mandatory intro number for the severely hackneyed Vilayaadu and even the theme just meanders. But Kanavellaam has enough stuff in terms of lyrics (father-son dialog) and those mild orchestral tweaks to catch your attention and sustain it. Despite three solid melodies, G.V.Prakash Kumar would be better off differentiating himself from his peers.

Keywords: Kireedam, Kreedom, Kreedam, Kridam, Kridom, Mohanlal, Thilagan, Ajit, Ajith, Ajithkumar, Trisha

Note: Kreedam music review in Tamil…here!

As if the cheesy title isn’t enough, Alisha continues to insist on singing every song like a woman in heat, for no apparent reason. To be fair, UK-based composer Ravi Bal’s orchestration is crowd-pleasing with Sohneya aaja and Tra la la making the cut as far as catchiness goes. Sachin Gupta’s repertoire is similar with 2 very neat tracks, the tranc’ish Silsila and Ghazal, where Alisha goes unplugged with nothing to distract from that velvety voice besides a guitar! Be my lady, Alisha’s duet with Apache Indian, is laughably silly. Alisha could do with less moaning, next time.

Keywords: Alisha Chinai, Ravi Bal, Apache Indian, Shut up, shut up, kiss me

Despite severe media drubbing, I finally watched Jhoom barabar jhoom, thanks to one sole voice of approval - Baradwaj Rangan! And…I loved it! After Jaan-e-mann, here’s another film maker who innovates on the format! We Indians have a low threshold for stories that happen over short periods of time and also insist on all 42 navarasas being part of the film. So, when a filmmaker turns it all in its head, we ditch him for being over smart! JBJ is a well-scripted film that gets its innovative format right. Even the music by Shankar, Ehsaan and Loy sits so well atop the wacky structure, with some fantastic over-the-top choreography. It’s a simple he/she-loves-me, loves-me-not story that works only because the screenplay drags it appropriately with all the necessary gimmicks. Bobby and Lara steal the limited scenes they appear in, while Preity looks tired and Abhishek is a bit too suave for the street-smart act. Its pretty sad to see Yash Raj taste defeat in their most experimental, ahead-of-its time venture. This is one film that deserved the ‘collections’ advertisement they so fondly release to proclaim their success!

Keywords: Abhishek Bachchan, Lara Dutta, Preity Zinta, Bobby Deol

What’s this obsession with logic in the recently-released Sivaji? Every single Tamil weekly review adds a line saying that a particular scene defies logic. Examples quoted include the hawala transaction, Rajinikanth’s cable-cutting act (!), Rajinikanth resurrected after being declared dead etc. Is a puny (Think Dhanush!) hero fighting 15 guys logical…and to think, that’s been happening for ages now, in Tamil cinema. Cinema is a make-believe art with only a few directors treading the realistic path. Shankar perhaps adds scenes for the effect, not for the logic. Is it so hard for reviewers to accept this fact?

Keywords: Sivaji, Rajinkant, Logic, Illogical

Jab maine has Shaan jiving to cute, school-boy angst and a neat, stereotyped rock and roll. Dominique does well in Home - a nostalgic solo, while Usha Uthup’s Teri meri - however lively it sounds - is seeped in monotony. Anjan Dutt’s evocative, John Denver’ish title song is no patch on his better Bengali tracks but Dibyendu’s rendition in the latino-tinged Dance through the night is better. Father-son duo Anjan & Neel perform their best in the themes, even though their relative influences are apparent. Neel Dutt’s music in this soundtrack is perhaps as limited as the community the film highlights.

Keywords: Anjan Dutta, Pritish Nandy, Lilette Dubey, Neha Dubey, Moon Moon Sen, Victor Banerjee, Anglo Indian community

No more nubile young things lip-syncing to Lata Mangeshkar. Thankfully, Saadgi is not a soundtrack and can be listened to, for simple and straight reasons as Lata’s vocals and some mellifluous tunes by Mayuresh Pai. The consistently moody album’s highlights include Mujhe khabar, Andhe khwaabon and Main kahan - with Javed Akhtar, Meraj Faizabadi and Chandrashekhar Sanekar respectively turning in appropriately deep lyrics. Other notable tracks include the mildly sunny Jo itne kareeb and Phir kahin door, distantly reminiscent of Hariharan’s Ab koi khwab. Saadgi is a pretty decent attempt by the young composer and resonates well with Lata’s experience.

The only reason why I even ended up watching Ne le dis à personne (Tell no one) is that the plot reminded me of one of my favorite European films, the Dutch ‘Spoorloos’ (remade as the godawful ‘The Vanishing’ by Hollywood’s dumb money-machines). The source book by Harlan Coben makes fantastic fodder for a taut, racy thriller and it’s a complete surprise that the French overtook Hollywood moghuls in taking it to its movie version – thank heavens for that!

French actor Guillaume Canet, who I last remember playing the lead in that sparkling, very-European ‘Jeux d’enfants’, gets behind the camera and directs this one with total mastery over the proceedings and that noticeable urgency in camera movement, replete with uniquely-French trappings like that lesbian couple with no explicit scenes, a lean-mean, emotionless hit-woman and minor blink-miss roles by American actors, led by Kristin Scott Thomas as one of the lesbian partners.

The plot is as exciting as any other Coben material – Paediatrician Alexander Beck’s wife Margot is brutally murdered and the doc is left mourning, when he, after 8 long years, gets a live video feed in an anonymous email, in which Margot looks at him longingly, in real time and just walks along! Lead man François Cluzet is mostly wimpish even as he goes on the run with the help of his thug friend Bruno. The narrative is appropriately twisted even though the plot lays itself out rather straight with some uncomfortably convenient plot devices and that minor deviation from Coben’s original culmination, that somehow seems better in a movie version.

At the end, I personally thought that this could make a fantastic Bollywood or even a Tamil movie. Considering how amazingly Gautam Menon massacred Derailed for Pachaikili Muthucharam (the less said about the Hindi adaptation, The Train, the better!), he could redeem himself even if he just lifts scenes from Ne le dis à personne for a Tamil version. The emotional core of this film is pretty much on par with the kind of eternal love our Indian protagonists profess day in and day out. Isn’t that reason enough for an Indian remake?

Keywords: European cinema, French films, Thriller, Best seller

Rajinikant Ver. 2.0

Receded hairline…uncheck.
Age lines all over the face…uncheck.
Slightly tired swagger…uncheck.
Down market dress sense that wishes to address other markets…uncheck.
Same ‘ol explosive and predictable intro scene…uncheck.

Shankar Ver. 0.5

A one man crusader hero…check.
Larger than life image for the lead character…check.
Semblance of a story…check.
Mega ambitious song picturisations…check.
A dhavani heroine who can add generous oomph to the songs…check.

That, in a nut shell, explains Sivaji, the experience. Shankar goes for B-school precision in image makeover by taking up every single factor in Rajinikant’s 1.0 career and launches the long pending 2.0 version of his enigmatic image. The only thing that gets lost in the process is the middle class resonance of Shankar’s quasi-relevant social themes. Which is not a really big deal, considering how big the actual Rajini market is - except that the believability-factor here stretches far beyond the usual suspension of disbelief we are normally accustomed to in a Shankar film and convincingly enters Rajini’s territory.

It’s also rather surprising that Vivek gets almost equal footage with Rajnikant, but that ends up looking like one master stroke of a decision by Shankar, since the comedian is in his best form playing a hilarious sidekick to the star - almost every line uttered by him is thoroughly enjoyable! The screenplay, interestingly, follows the setup-turn-prestige acts, invented by Christopher Priest in his 1995 novel! The side-part wigged Rajini just having rambunctious fun in the setup; the normal Rajini we’re used to, just after he’s left with a one rupee coin in the turn and the rocking mottai Rajni, aptly resurrected for the prestige! Shankar skillfully pulls the rabbits at the right time, to evoke the maximum whistles and hoots, and that includes the references to other leading stars of Tamil cinema - MGR, Sivaji and Kamal Hassan.

The canvas is massive, more so for the songs, though Shankar’s tedium shows in Ballelakka and the claustrophobic (albeit in a smashing glass dome!) Sahana. But the other 3 songs more than make it up, particularly the incredibly-mounted Athiradee. Suman underplays his villainy well considering what he pulls off is far more credible than most Rajnikant villains. Shreya is fantastic eye-candy. A R Rahman’s background score is as massy as it can get and elevates the mood appropriately.

So there! You have the perfect concoction of THE masala film that the Indian cinema industry is famed for. Any other change in the formula is bound to evoke such a drastic imbalance that it may not be decent business sense at all to go ahead with, in the first place. Shankar’s career graph shows a peculiar trend. He alternates between a serious ‘message’ film and a harmless fun film (barring the seriously gone wrong Hindi sojourn in Nayak!). Gentleman - Kaadhalan. Indian - Jeans. Mudhalvan - Boys. Anniyan - Sivaji? Makes perfect sense, considering Sivaji is nothing more than a rollicking make believe yarn that plays to the gallery in every single, well-crafted scene. If you curtail all urges to look for the connection and believability of Shankar’s serious ventures, this can be an immensely rewarding experience.

But, as all good things go, Rajnikant should seriously consider retirement, considering how haggard he looks in most close-ups, despite all that wizardry by the technical crew. His lack of agility is clearly evident in the dance sequences, where the choreographers skillfully try to appease their thalaivar by inventing milder movements. That the fans of this 58 year old super star fans have closed their eyes to his retirement is a different thing, but the eventual problem is that the star may become a caricature of himself, if he doesn’t - to borrow an oft used filmi adage - ‘play his age’, soon and end up like a South Indian version of Navin Nischol in Nagesh Kukunoor’s incredibly funny Bollywood Calling. I suppose the animated version of the star in his daughter’s directorial debut is an interesting way to keep the legacy alive!

Keywords: Sivaji movie review, Shivaji film review, Rajinikanth, Shriya Saran, Shreya Saran, Tamil film reviews

Note: Sivaji review in Tamil…here!