Rann (2010) - A real fairy tale...

The movie is good even though the plot is a simple one of good guys win and bad guys loose. Excellent acting by some big names and crisp implementation of the above mentioned simple plot mixed with some good camera work (fisheye lens and floating cams - hallmark of Ramu) and posh locations makes Rann a nice, entertaining movie.

For those who were expecting connections with reality or any kind of realistic coverage of the play between politics and media... they should go watch Page 3. For people expecting to see the industry-politics game being played... they should go watch Corporate. This is nowhere close to a Madhur Bhandarkar movie.

Why? Because Rann does not do justice to the complex and floating reality of this game. Rann starts out in the grey area, connecting with several 'real' events, but soon the black and white squares are clearly visible. You can easily label the good and bad guys unlike in the real world where it is very difficult to do the same in the political arena.

In any kind of big scam, sting operation or scandel no one has the complete information. No one can be painted black or white. Most times media is the one responsible for creating this grey area.

While Rann makes several important points about media and how it is used and abused, it is in no way a ground breaking movie. Still watch it! I guarantee you won't be bored.

:)

My Name is Khan... Rizwan Khan and I am Autistic!

The movie has done four very important things:
1) Introduced autism to the Indian audience.
2) Shown the America outside the glitzy cities.
3) Managed to bring together foreign and Indian actors seamlessly.
4) Shown the future of Indian cinema - collaboration with foreign studios.

This movie is a rough diamond. It has various bits going for it. The fact that it shows life in suburban America as well as in the smaller towns of the American south. Most Bollywood movies restrict themselves to big cities, typically shooting few critical scenes on location and finishing the rest in Mumbai.
Also the interaction between foreign and Indian actors is amazingly seamless. It must be a first for any movie coming out of a main-stream big budget production house. Maybe the reason for that is the fact that majority of the cast is foreign. The 'friends' do not feel pasted on.
Even though I found it hard to feel the much touted chemistry between Kajol and SRK, I could feel some kind of a chemistry between SRK and his neighbours.
Maybe this is the magic of collaborating with 20th Century Fox?

The Muslim and post 9/11 angle is about 3-4 years too late. Certain elements of the movie seem to be inserted for no reason and they do not really add anything to the story line (for e.g. long shots of SRK walking in the middle of nowhere - maybe he was searching for the US President under a rock in the desert?- and the stabbing scene).
The character of Rizwan Khan need not have been autistic. It would have been more of a challenge to show a mentally 'normal' Muslim male trying to do all this. In many parts of the movie being autistic gets him off the hook or gets him additional sympathy. Also as they say a disability or a disadvantage is a sure way of winning the audience.

The result is Mr Rizwan Khan comes out looking like a bad mix of James Bond and Mahatma Gandhi.

All in all worth watching once if you can sit through wave after wave of emotional scenes (trying to get a response from the audience) and long speeches by SRK . If nothing else watch this movie to see where Indian cinema is heading.

Oh and please don't look for 'logic' in the movie... after all this IS a Karan Johar movie and you know what they say about a dog and its tail.

:)