Badmaash Company Movie Review: Beware of this “Barbaad Company"

There are some movies which are good and some which are bad and some which fall somewhere in between. But I’m going to be now analyzing a movie which falls under a completely new category- movies which are plain boring. I’ll come to that in due course of time. But as of now lets talk about YRF one of the most well known production & distribution houses in the country. A few years ago Yash Chopra & Aditya Chopra decided to follow the Hollywood style of “studio” functioning in the full sense by making multiple movies every year with a lot of directors signed up for multi film contracts. They realized that it was the best way to go in terms of scaling up since the father & son team couldn’t direct too many films by themselves.

So then we saw a slew of films across genres from romance ( Fanaa, Hum Tum, Saathiya, Bachna Ae Haseeno etc ), action ( Dhoom series ), sports ( Chak De India ), social ( Aaja Nachle, Laaga Chunari Mein Daag ), animation ( Roadside Romeo ), terrorism (New York ), slice of life ( Rocket Singh : Salesman of the Year ) etc. All these films have been directed by outside directors like Kunal Kohli, Siddharth Anand,Shimit Amin, Kabeer Khan, Sanjay Gadhvi etc. While some of the films worked, some didn’t and the films kept coming to us in regular intervals.

Whenever a YRF film flopped the detractors would say that the glory days of YRF are coming to an end and when a film became a hit the detractors would again say it was probably a fluke or something else. Of course loyalists continued to remain stead fast in their faith towards the films coming out from YRF. I for one have been following all their films for the past so many years and watch them all- sometimes feeling satisfied & sometimes not so satisfied. So all this was at the back of my mind when I went on to watch their recent film Badmaash Company, the directorial debut of actor Parmeet Sethi and having a young team of actors.

Shahid Kapur who has been going through a lean patch after Kaminey (Dil Bole Hadippa, Chance Pe Dance & Paathshaala being flops) and Anushka Sharma (finally seen again after RNBDJ) play the leads here. The story is all about how Karan (Shahid) &Bulbul ( Anushka ) along with their friends –Chandu ( Vir Das ) and Zing ( Meiyang Chang) go through a roller coaster ride of doing wrong things the right way i.e their way.
Set in the 1990’s when consumerism in India was still at its infant stage and with import-export policies being a lot different then, these 4 friends decide to start an importing business and make use of loopholes in the system as they develop their own ways of beating the system.

A rare paisa vasool moment

This in a nutshell friends is what the film is all about and yes like most other Hindi films these days, the action shifts from India to overseas ( the U.S here ) in the 2nd half giving way for more of the same stuff. Frankly speaking the 1st half gets to a close within an hour’s span and it leaves you wondering what you had been seeing till then. Ridiculous mechanisms of con jobs are shown again & again with Shahid trying to make us understand the process flow completely.

So at the half way stage as the action shifts to the U.S you are hoping that there would be something more interesting happening and that one would finally witness some genuine moments. Alas! Nothing such happens and you get to see the same silly con jobs handled the same way and depicted in the same way- its like Parmeet felt-“let’s maintain the consistency friends” . The sequences especially in the 2nd half leave you completely cold and you are left wondering what’s happening. Check out the “Bleeding Madras” sequence especially the portion with Michael Jackson ( yes I’m serious ) and you’ll know where I’m coming from.

Talking about the acting and the characters – Shahid Kapur looks so disinterested that you are left wondering what happened to the Shahid of films like Jab We Met & Kaminey.The only thing for Anushka is that she gets to sport some yuppy outfits when compared to her previous film- otherwise she has relatively nothing else to do. Vir Das & Meiyang Chang are decent, but no great shakes. But it’s a matter of great pity that veteran artistes like Pawan Malhotra, Anupam Kher and Kiran Juneja also have nothing much to do. In the beginning when you see Anupam Kher and Kiran Juneja playing Shahid Kapur’s parents, you get a vision of Khosla Ka Ghosla in your mind, but all that thought goes crashing very soon.

Music by Pritam is very ordinary and you’d hardly remember any songs after you complete the film. This is very surprising since most YRF films are known to have a good soundtrack. If the 1st half of the movie left you feeling what happened in the 1 hr of duration, the 2nd half comes across as very slow, lengthy and irritating overall. So let me go back to the different category of films that I started mentioning initially- movies which are plain boring. Badmaash Company is a prime example of such movies. I’d not really like to slot it in any other way.

At the time of writing this I realize that the movie is doing decently at the box office and may end up being commercially good for YRF. That makes me all the more worried- will a “barbaad company” like this inspire more such “barbaad” films from YRF? I hope not so that I’ll again go and watch their next film like I usually do.

Originally published in PFC- http://passionforcinema.com/badmaash-company-movie-review-beware-of-this-%E2%80%9Cbarbaad-company%E2%80%9D/

Wanted- Young Stars, Where are they?

Note- By young star the reference here is to an actor in his 20’s and who has enough star power to carry off a film on his ‘young’ shoulders.]
A short while ago when I was in Mumbai I was involved in a discussion with some friends which included a few PFC authors as well. All of a sudden the discussion started focusing on one aspect- who is the best young actor in Hindi cinema these days? Most people said Shahid, one or two said Ranbir and probably someone took Imran’s name as well. Mind you this discussion took place a week before the release of Wake Up Sid and maybe if it happened after the release, Ranbir may have got a few more votes.
Now quite recently I was talking to another friend and discussing who would be the ideal candidate to do Ram Charan Teja’s role in Magadheera’s Hindi version. After a lot of thought I realized that probably the best choice for the same would be none other than Hrithik Roshan. Yes I do agree that Hrithik is certainly a decade older than Ram Charan, but then considering that the hero in Magadheera has to fight, dance, ride a horse, wear a period costume, perform bike stunts and most importantly look convincing in all these, nobody else I thought fit the bill better than Hrithik.
Most of us must be aware of the buzz created a few days back by apparent rumors that the producers of Magadheera ( Geeta Arts ) have decided to rope in Hrithik and Aamir to portray the hero in the Hindi version ( Hrithik for the past and Aamir for the present ). All this has made me ask the question aloud- where are the young stars in Hindi Cinema today? My personal observation is that Shahid Kapur certainly can fit the bill to a reasonable extent. While with a Ishq Vishk, Vivaah and Jab We Met he proved that he can pull of a romantic and family oriented film, the action genre still eluded him. After Kaminey even that has been handled to some extent.
But what Shahid needs now is to prove that he can pull off an out and out masala entertainer and emerge a big star in his own right. While Saawariya and Bachna Ae Haseeno invoked mixed response to Ranbir’s acting, Wake Up Sid has certainly brought in favorable response and now I think its clear that for light hearted romantic flicks Ranbir can certainly be an ideal choice. Even his forthcoming movies like Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani and probably even Rocket Singh: Salesman of the Year seem to suggest the same. Prakash Jha’s Rajneeti might make a difference as it would be something out of the ordinary for him. But in spite of all this it’s still debatable if he can carry off a masala action entertainer. We need to wait and watch.
As for Imran Khan I do not really have much to say. I think the success of his first movie – JTYJN was due to a combination of A.R.Rehman’s music, the script and the performances of the entire star cast and not of Imran in particular. His later movies like Kidnap and Luck have not done anything positive for Imran. It’s probably even too tempting to say that Imran has probably been overrated a bit too early. Lets see if his forthcoming releases like Delhi Belly manage to create a more positive impact and tell us if he’s overrated or not.
Now let’s talk about Neil Nitin Mukesh who made a decent debut with Johnny Gaddar. While he looked lost in Aa Dekhen Zaraa, he was all right in New York but still has a long way to go before he can give us the confidence that he is a big star in the making. While Madhur Bhandarkar’s Jail could be a turning point for him, its time that Neil also decides to move out of the serious grim roles and loosen up a bit and do a light entertainer too so that we can see some variety from him. Now the only other names that I can think off are Kunal Khemu, Emran Hashmi, Sharman Joshi and Riteish Deshmukh.
While Kunal Khemu is certainly a good actor I really doubt if he could carry off the larger than life roles convincingly. Emran Hashmi,Sharman Joshi and Riteish Deshmukh are people who have just turned 30 and can maybe easily pass off as few years younger as well. After doing some trademark movies the actor in Emran has finally started emerging with movies like Awarapan and Jannat, but he still needs to do more such movies before getting universal acceptance. Sharman Joshi and Riteish Deshmukh have unfortunately got slotted as actors who excel in comedy films and though they have done movies like Life in a Metro, Rang De Basanti, Sorry Bhai (Sharman) Naach, Cash ( Riteish ) which are not comedy films, they still tend to get associated more with the lighter movies. Hopefully an Aladin and a Rann for Ritesh or 3 Idiots for Sharman will help in proving their versatility.
When we look at the scene in regional cinema, the scene is a bit different. While in Bengali and Malayalam cinema the situation is somewhat similar, it’s a lot different in Tamil and Telugu cinema. In Malayalam Prithviraj is the only actor among the young brigade who looks well set to fill in the slot that’s firmly occupied by Mammootty and Mohanlal. In Bengali cinema for a long time now it’s basically Prasenjit Chatterjee and Mithunda who have been ruling the roost. The only other actor who has managed to make a serious impact is Jeet who shot into prominence with his debut film itself (Saathi).

Prasenjit Chatterjee and Ranjit Mullick - Mama BhagneThrough there are other talented actors like Jishu Sengupta who have been hovering around for ages, they are yet to get their due. Dev is the current sensation and might probably join the ranks of Jeet to prove a worthy challenger to Prasenjit. A case in point about the lack of younger stars can be seen in the form of a recent Bengali movie- Mama Bhagne ( remake of Govinda’s Rajaji : ) ) where Ranjit Mullick and Prasenjit play the uncle and nephew respectively whereas ideally one would expect younger stars to fill the requirement.
The situation certainly is a lot better in Tamil and Telugu cinema. While Rajnikanth and Kamal Haasan are still going strong and Vijay,Ajith, Surya, Vikram, Madhavan constitute the next layer, there’s also a big pool of younger actors in Tamil like Dhanush, Simbu, Vishal, Bharat, Arya, Jeeva, Jayam Ravi and a lot many more. While Dhanush, Simbu and Vishal are focusing on trying to be the next big star, people like Jeeva (Katradhu Tamizh, Raam, Siva Manasule Sakthi etc), Bharat ( Kadhal, Pattiyal etc ) and Arya ( Arindhum Ariyamalum, Pattiyal, Naan Kadavul etc ) are trying to make a balance in their choice of movies. Telugu cinema also has a lot of younger actors like Jr.NTR, Allu Arjun, Ram Charan Teja, Ram, Allari Naresh etc who have reasonable star power.
Having mentioned all this let me get back to my earlier questions. Who do you think is the best young actor in Hindi cinema these days? And who do you think will ideally be fit to do Ram Charan Teja’s role in Magadheera’s Hindi version? I don’t think there would be too much of confusion regarding the responses to these questions, nevertheless let me wait and see what you all have to say. Let us remember that most of the popular stars today like SRK, Aamir,Salman,Akshay,Hrithik, Sanjay Dutt, Abhishek, Ajay Devgan etc all had become stars before they even turned 30. After all there are very few people like Amitabh Bachchan who started a bit late and turned a star in their 30’s. Considering that it’s tough to say how many of the current lot would go on to emulate their seniors. Time alone would say. In the meanwhile let us look forward to Hrithik (in all likelihood) doing the Hindi version of Magadheera. After all wasn’t it just recently that we saw Salman Khan doing his version of Mahesh Babu’s Pokiri (Wanted)?
Note- I have on purpose not discussed people like Zayed Khan, Harman Baweja, Jacky Bhagnani etc for obvious reasons.

Originally published in PFC.Check it out here- http://passionforcinema.com/wanted-young-stars-where-are-they/