REVIEW: Kites (3)

KATI PATANG

Unabashed romance. That's what Bollywood dreams are built on. It's the gaze, the wooing, the sweeping the girl off her feet that every woman in the audience wants to see. When the hero runs towards the heroine our collective hearts anticipate everything from her surrender in his arms to another verbal banter. He would be the best boy at school and college. He would dance like a dream. And he would have to win the hearts of the family as well. If the heroine is shown to be interested in another man, or simply unaware of his interest in her, we would be on his side, fingers crossed ready to offer our shoulders when he sings, 'kaise batayein...tu jaane naa!' As an audience we are willing to be manipulated any which way by the story take us. So stepping into Hrithik Roshan's Kites was easy. I knew there would be romance coming out my ears...

Pure Dhishoom dhishoom. The hero may or may not sing and dance around the trees, but he would have to smolder in love. There would be baddies to beat and if the hero starts out as a goonda, we even watch as long as he uses his muscle to win the heroine. We want the hero to shed blood, scoop her up in his manly arms and ride away with her into the sunset. So stepping into Kites was easy. Hrithik in Dhoom could ride away with the gal on the mo'bike and ooh, he has muscles...

REALITY KA THAPPAD

Visually, Kites starts out as a big canvas. The beautiful Mojave desert and Las Vegas have featured in everything from the Joshua Tree by U2 and Desert Rose by Sting and many movies which wiki lists here

There's a bare bodied Hrithik Roshan and a foreign import that wears even fewer clothes and supposedly looks better our gals. But Las Vegas? desert? I found myself thinking SUNBURN but was treated to snorkeling and yacht ride with people basking a la kingfisher calendar. It's not a dream sequence. They have taken a trip. Did the bad guy say 'picnic'? I am not sure. I was still trying to figure out whether the Mexican peasant/doc who removed the bullet from Hrithik's back touched a nerve or something, because Hrithik was limping across the desert. or was it Oliver Stone's magic bullet?

Hmm. Someone also forgot to see the map. In order to reach Las Vegas from, Mexico Hrithik would need to walk across Arizona and partly Nevada. And to come sexily close to a bikini clad lass on the yacht and frolic in the sea from Las Vegas would need either a drive across Nevada and California... certainly not a day trip!

The next slap comes to you when they show incessant rain. Who thought this up? It's Las Vegas, smack in the middle of the desert you just showed us. Look it up! The wettest month is February, with 0.69 inches of rain during the ENTIRE month. So why was it raining as if it were Cherrapunji? I guess it's as real as Kabir Bedi's character called 'Bob' who is supposed to be so powerful, 'no one can say no to Bob'. Thank you very much! We prefer our baddies to be called Gabbar Singh or Shakaal, at least.

Woh Kaata! Kaipoche! Geli re! I cannot begin to list the languages in which we yell at the cutting of a line attached to a kite. This one uses a Mexican woman who compels our hero to spout in an affected voice that he kaka en his pantalones. Oh come on! What happened to the cute scene where he's trying to learn Spanish via dictionary? The oft-used phrases page was missing? Yes-yes, the two bodies come close, very close and veer away so often that you want to slap them. She's engaged to the bad ass brother who belongs to a mafia in the gambling business. Why is she playing coy virgin with the hero when she willingly goes with the baddie who slaps her butt? And the hero conveniently falls in love with her at one glance? It's 2010 guys, and even dancing lad Shahid Kapoor has kissed Anushka Sharma a couple of weeks ago. This 'will he, wont he' thing eats up so much footage, you suddenly appreciate the honesty in Emraan Hashmi Mallika Sherwat kisses you once tweeted as #fail to turn on.

Just when you are falling asleep for the lack of romance or are doing some of your own snogging because you are so fed up, Hrithik has left the building with firang babe in tow. The baddies have manipulated cops who are chasing them. Good! Hrithik beats the cops by pin-balling them with a car, and there are explosions. Why is the action dull? It's not one car, but four cars doing the same to more cop cars. You are wondering how a girl who does not understand anything but Spanish reads English SMS that Hrithik sends her, and why Hrithik parks the car (that the baddie gifted him) right outside her apartment before a lover's tryst. And why the baddie doesn't recognize the car he gifted to hero parked outside the girl's apartment.

But hold your horses people, the movie just got funnier. The hero who speaks English and the heroine who speaks only Spanish and leetil English find accommodations in a motel that looks more like Film City than a saloon from High Noon. It is so fake Western Cowboy one horse hick town set you almost expect Hrithik bathing in a oak barrel. No such luck. Fake cops, fake uniforms, fake bounty hunting cowboys, fake shotguns everyone kill each other while hero and heroine escape. Why didn't they just die in that crossfire, we wonder.

They are being chased across strangest vistas, but thankfully they cross the borders and reach Mexico. Where they get the limo with Nevada plates in Mexico don't know, but the friend who helps them says, he will get their passports within five days. You are slapped again. How did they cross the border without getting shot or caught? And the friend who is being extra chirpy is predictably killed by baddies who have chased them down here. Oh that's just after the hero has married the heroine in a Mexican church dressed up in Mexican regalia. You really don't care. You brain is playing the demented song, 'Suit pehen ke ban gaya dulha, kal tak tha jo nanga... tennu dulha kinne banaya bhootni ke!'

But the movie has gone ahead. There are so many bullets wasted, you wish the bad guys employed goons with a better aim. But whattodo, the hero and heroine have escaped. The hero gets help from Jodha Akbar's Bairam Khan. He looks like he's about to say, 'Jahanpanaah' to Hrithik, but doesn't. And when you are horrified at more rain in Las Vegas, the director confuses you with more flashback/real time patang match. You give up. You concentrate on the firang babe.

Barbara Mori's body is hot enough. It's the lips that reminded me of Urmila Matondkar's lip acting repertoire. Half open, quivering, wobbly, pouting, half smile, full-on smile... name it, and Barbara's mouth can compete with our desi gal's Dior red lips. Thankfully she dies and so does he. And you are wholly untouched by the tragedy. Why? because you wanted to see Hrithik dance at least one Pasa Doble to prove his passion for her or the sexy tango. Break dancing? Didn't wash.

Kites is a colossal waste of everyone's time and money. It would be smarter to see Shrek Forever After playing in the next auditorium at the multiplex. It may be a fairy tale, but it promises true love's kiss. Far better than a film that after 130 minutes is still trying to figure out if it is English, Hindi, Spanish, a romance, action or western...

Comments

[Louis Vuitton Bags]

HIDING FROM THE MOUTAIN HIGH.....LOOKING AT MOON AND CLEAR BLUE SKY.....

[harini calamur]

it seemed to be paying 'tribute' to too many sources, and at such didn't know what it was doing.
there were glimpses of blade runner in the styling of the night shots with rain.
there was the salaam to thelma and louise
then there was the ek dujhe ke liye nod...
and it seemed like too many different stories, badly cobbled together to produce a 2 hour interlude - i hate to call it a film - that left me cold.
the last scene - after he jumps - the audience in the Pune theater - was in splits :)
it was worse than a bad film - it was a boring film - and that in my opinion - is the worst thing that one can do to the audience.

[alfy]

KITES movie, finally the long wait for Hrithik Roshan fans is over. With this action packed romantic thriller, Hrithik Roshan has made his debut in Hollywood. Kites movie story is not different, we have already seen many films on this very own concept. What that makes a difference in this movie is its taking, the action scenes, and the chemistry. Kites music, especially Kites background music has been excellent. Many known reviewers from India is slightly under negative side. But the International reviewers has given Kites good marks, and some of famous English movie sites lauded Hrithik Roshan as ‘a Man with green eyes and near divine looks’! Some question left after viewing is that, “Is this what a common man is looking for in one of the most awaited movies of the year? Isn’t it a responsibility of the makers to entertain us along with these additional added elements in the script? Do we visit the theater only to see some new foreign locations, few good action scenes on the screen and a speedy thriling love (without depth). Kites is visually stunning and makes a sweeping impact, but it totters in its writing department.
Hrithik is unbeatable and that's the truth. Very few actors can rise above the script and Hrithik is one of them. He's the lifeline of this film. Barbara Mori looks perfect for her part, but appears slightly mature at some places. Even though the film is nice comparing the repeadted stuffs in bollywood & one of the best movies released yet. If you are going to watch just go and watch, and be in the film, not be with your friends.