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meganbmoore into Booooooolllllllywood. (Or anyone else who is interested).
I bring you a pusher post for Karam. Because hey, I know you like Asian movies, and this is the closest I've seen Bollywood come to an East Asian film. Plus, no people dancing in Switzerland but rain, doomed love, dark characters, and a lot of gun violence. So yeah. It’s violent, it’s angsty as hell, it has striking visuals, the music is great, and I think this is some of the leads' best acting to date.
Plot: John (John Abraham) is a highly competent contract killer for the mob boss, Captain. He is OK with his job and is also madly in love with his wife Shalini (Priyanka Chopra) who loves him despite knowing of his occupation. However, during a routine hit (he is supposed to eliminate some mob rival or a politician or God knows who), the contract goes dreadfully wrong and a family (a father, mother and a little girl) end up murdered. After accidentally killing a child, John hands in his resignation, as an assassin with PTSD has a very short life expectancy, but his timing couldn’t be worse as Captain just started a new mob war. He wants 5 targets “taken care of” in the next 36 hours and he holds Shalini hostage to ensure John’s compliance. And this is where the fun (or angst) starts.
First, a word of warning: this is a very violent movie. Have a dog bite off bits of a person violent. Your level of squeamishness may vary. Now, on to the good stuff:
I love the visual look of this movie: the drawings, the selective use of black and white (my favorite example is John’s nightmare when he sees Shalini shot in front of his eyes. Everything is in black and white except for two goldfish in their tank). It doesn’t look like anything else I’ve seen. The whole movie actually doesn’t feel Bollywood. It is something I imagine coming out of Hong Kong or Japanese movie industry, not India. The pace actually is very good, a rarity for a Bollywood thriller. I think part of the reason this movie flopped was the darkness (it is a very bleak film, even if a tremendously romantic one at the same time) but part was the fact that it really doesn’t feel Bollywood in the least.
Any quota I had for John angst has been satisfied. Suicidal-level angsty and messed-up and madly in love? I am so there, baby! Between his flashbacks to the little girl and his agony over his wife’s suffering because it’s his fault, this character is having a couple of days from hell. You do end up rooting for his character to overcome the bad(der) guys, but you know there can’t be a happy ending for him. In a way it is Karma for killing that family: he has to see his own family suffer. He is not a nice guy by any stretch of the imagination, not the usual noble if wronged hero, blazing his way through horrid bad guys.
Priyanka is also really great in this movie (she and John have crazy chemistry) as the story’s only real innocent. (Told you the movie was dark). But is she really such an innocent? She is hardly Padme “you are going where I can’t follow” type. She wants her husband to quit the racket, but she stays with him even if he doesn’t. He always comes first with her (when he wants to turn himself in to the police, she talks him out of it, because she doesn’t want to lose him). When she tries to escape and/or kill herself so that John would not be forced to pick up his gun yet again, she is doing it mainly because she doesn’t want him to suffer.
Secondly, I loved the music. It has one of those modern approaches where (except for the first song), the songs are either there because they make sense (they are being sung in a nightclub) or are a voice-over over the character’s actions. All of them are very appropriate except for the first song that plays over the opening credits. While the melody is lovely and John and Priyanka look equally lovely together, it is strikingly inappropriate for the movie’s dark, desperate, and far from traditional tone. But hey, enjoy it while it lasts, because once the credits are over, so is any bit of fun or happiness for John and Shalini.
The second song (sung by Shalini in a nightclub) has a haunting melody and is used to great effect later in the movie when she hums it to him, crying, on the telephone, right before she slits her wrists.
The second nightclub song (where he takes care of his first target) is rather blah but the imagery (girls in champagne glasses) is rather striking.
The song playing in voice-over as she slits her wrists and is rushed to a hospital as he is curled into a ball somewhere, falling apart and crying, when they both have flashbacks to their previous life together (once again, enjoy the miliseconds of fun, they won’t last) is also lovely.
But my favorite is the title song, as he wonders the streets realizing that he can never really escape what he has done, and that he just needs to do what he can to save his wife and unborn child.
OK, favorite scenes, in no order (besides what I’ve mentioned in the picturization above):
1. When John learns he is going to be a father from the Captain. What a horrible way to find out.
2. The intercut between Captain’s flunky entering shrinking Shalini’s room and John opening an elegantly wrapped box that contains…his wife’s finger. And Captain’s note to the effect of “how many more bad deeds will you force me to do.”
3. John and Shalini’s last phone conversation, when they are both crying as she is wishing him happy anniversary, and hums her song, then she tells him she loves him, hangs up, and slits her wrists.
4. John and the Police Officer’s conversation in the rain, where John begs him for help. The Officer points out that as the murdered family was nothing to John, Shalini is nothing to him.
5. The very first phone conversation between the freaking-out John and clueless Shalini. She babbles happily and asks him to blow her a kiss. When he is in the mobster’s den, being dictated terms.
6. When she calls him when she escapes from the hospital and he arrives and they first see each other. Phew, chemistry! And then they try to cross the road to get to each other, but before he can get to her she is pulled into a van.
7. When he tries to shoot target No. 1 but keeps freaking out, because he is imagining the little girl instead (and earlier when he was throwing up after the accidental massacre).
8. When he is dying and she is running to him, and he sees her as he saw her on their wedding day.
Here are the picturizations from Karam.
My favorite song in the movie and one of my favorite picturizations. Also a good sample why this movie died at the box-office faster than I can say 'Karam.' It's all about trippy and damaged and monster people and more beautiful angst and bizarre weirdness than you can shake a stick at (the random people who are engaged in unsavories are John's bosses and his marks, the people searching his apartment are the cops who are drawing the net even tighter and the beautiful Priyanka, the only thing in color in the nightmare world is obviously his wife):
'Tinka Tinka' as performed by Priyanka's character (she is a nightclub singer wife of John Abraham's hitman). A bit darker, a bit odder, a lot sadder than a lot of Bolly songs. Still, not too trippy. Except for a minor fact that John Abraham comes in at the end from one of his hits:
First MV (opening credits) lures you into thinking this will be a 'business as usual' Bollywood movie. We get gorgeous people in billowing clothes being smiley in fantasy settings. If you only knew. This will the the first and last relaxed and sugar-spun moment the whole movie:
meganbmoore into Booooooolllllllywood. (Or anyone else who is interested).I bring you a pusher post for Karam. Because hey, I know you like Asian movies, and this is the closest I've seen Bollywood come to an East Asian film. Plus, no people dancing in Switzerland but rain, doomed love, dark characters, and a lot of gun violence. So yeah. It’s violent, it’s angsty as hell, it has striking visuals, the music is great, and I think this is some of the leads' best acting to date.
Plot: John (John Abraham) is a highly competent contract killer for the mob boss, Captain. He is OK with his job and is also madly in love with his wife Shalini (Priyanka Chopra) who loves him despite knowing of his occupation. However, during a routine hit (he is supposed to eliminate some mob rival or a politician or God knows who), the contract goes dreadfully wrong and a family (a father, mother and a little girl) end up murdered. After accidentally killing a child, John hands in his resignation, as an assassin with PTSD has a very short life expectancy, but his timing couldn’t be worse as Captain just started a new mob war. He wants 5 targets “taken care of” in the next 36 hours and he holds Shalini hostage to ensure John’s compliance. And this is where the fun (or angst) starts.
First, a word of warning: this is a very violent movie. Have a dog bite off bits of a person violent. Your level of squeamishness may vary. Now, on to the good stuff:
I love the visual look of this movie: the drawings, the selective use of black and white (my favorite example is John’s nightmare when he sees Shalini shot in front of his eyes. Everything is in black and white except for two goldfish in their tank). It doesn’t look like anything else I’ve seen. The whole movie actually doesn’t feel Bollywood. It is something I imagine coming out of Hong Kong or Japanese movie industry, not India. The pace actually is very good, a rarity for a Bollywood thriller. I think part of the reason this movie flopped was the darkness (it is a very bleak film, even if a tremendously romantic one at the same time) but part was the fact that it really doesn’t feel Bollywood in the least.
Any quota I had for John angst has been satisfied. Suicidal-level angsty and messed-up and madly in love? I am so there, baby! Between his flashbacks to the little girl and his agony over his wife’s suffering because it’s his fault, this character is having a couple of days from hell. You do end up rooting for his character to overcome the bad(der) guys, but you know there can’t be a happy ending for him. In a way it is Karma for killing that family: he has to see his own family suffer. He is not a nice guy by any stretch of the imagination, not the usual noble if wronged hero, blazing his way through horrid bad guys.
Priyanka is also really great in this movie (she and John have crazy chemistry) as the story’s only real innocent. (Told you the movie was dark). But is she really such an innocent? She is hardly Padme “you are going where I can’t follow” type. She wants her husband to quit the racket, but she stays with him even if he doesn’t. He always comes first with her (when he wants to turn himself in to the police, she talks him out of it, because she doesn’t want to lose him). When she tries to escape and/or kill herself so that John would not be forced to pick up his gun yet again, she is doing it mainly because she doesn’t want him to suffer.
Secondly, I loved the music. It has one of those modern approaches where (except for the first song), the songs are either there because they make sense (they are being sung in a nightclub) or are a voice-over over the character’s actions. All of them are very appropriate except for the first song that plays over the opening credits. While the melody is lovely and John and Priyanka look equally lovely together, it is strikingly inappropriate for the movie’s dark, desperate, and far from traditional tone. But hey, enjoy it while it lasts, because once the credits are over, so is any bit of fun or happiness for John and Shalini.
The second song (sung by Shalini in a nightclub) has a haunting melody and is used to great effect later in the movie when she hums it to him, crying, on the telephone, right before she slits her wrists.
The second nightclub song (where he takes care of his first target) is rather blah but the imagery (girls in champagne glasses) is rather striking.
The song playing in voice-over as she slits her wrists and is rushed to a hospital as he is curled into a ball somewhere, falling apart and crying, when they both have flashbacks to their previous life together (once again, enjoy the miliseconds of fun, they won’t last) is also lovely.
But my favorite is the title song, as he wonders the streets realizing that he can never really escape what he has done, and that he just needs to do what he can to save his wife and unborn child.
OK, favorite scenes, in no order (besides what I’ve mentioned in the picturization above):
1. When John learns he is going to be a father from the Captain. What a horrible way to find out.
2. The intercut between Captain’s flunky entering shrinking Shalini’s room and John opening an elegantly wrapped box that contains…his wife’s finger. And Captain’s note to the effect of “how many more bad deeds will you force me to do.”
3. John and Shalini’s last phone conversation, when they are both crying as she is wishing him happy anniversary, and hums her song, then she tells him she loves him, hangs up, and slits her wrists.
4. John and the Police Officer’s conversation in the rain, where John begs him for help. The Officer points out that as the murdered family was nothing to John, Shalini is nothing to him.
5. The very first phone conversation between the freaking-out John and clueless Shalini. She babbles happily and asks him to blow her a kiss. When he is in the mobster’s den, being dictated terms.
6. When she calls him when she escapes from the hospital and he arrives and they first see each other. Phew, chemistry! And then they try to cross the road to get to each other, but before he can get to her she is pulled into a van.
7. When he tries to shoot target No. 1 but keeps freaking out, because he is imagining the little girl instead (and earlier when he was throwing up after the accidental massacre).
8. When he is dying and she is running to him, and he sees her as he saw her on their wedding day.
Here are the picturizations from Karam.
My favorite song in the movie and one of my favorite picturizations. Also a good sample why this movie died at the box-office faster than I can say 'Karam.' It's all about trippy and damaged and monster people and more beautiful angst and bizarre weirdness than you can shake a stick at (the random people who are engaged in unsavories are John's bosses and his marks, the people searching his apartment are the cops who are drawing the net even tighter and the beautiful Priyanka, the only thing in color in the nightmare world is obviously his wife):
'Tinka Tinka' as performed by Priyanka's character (she is a nightclub singer wife of John Abraham's hitman). A bit darker, a bit odder, a lot sadder than a lot of Bolly songs. Still, not too trippy. Except for a minor fact that John Abraham comes in at the end from one of his hits:
First MV (opening credits) lures you into thinking this will be a 'business as usual' Bollywood movie. We get gorgeous people in billowing clothes being smiley in fantasy settings. If you only knew. This will the the first and last relaxed and sugar-spun moment the whole movie:
