15 Movie Questions Meme - Desi Edition

AKA: Pandrah "Filmon ke baare men Savaal" Meme

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PS: I've been learning Hindi for about 4 years now, but I'm still not perfect at it - so be free to correct me.

1) Movie you love with a passion.

Fillum, jisse tum sachaa pyaar karti ho. 

My first choice for this answer was Kal Ho Naa Ho, one of my all-time favorites - Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham isn't even one of my favorite films - but I decided to choose this incredibly kitschy and not-good-in-my-traditional-taste-for-movies film, because: it brought me to Bollywood. 

Might be that I would have "met" Bollywood however, under different circumstances, but I will never know, so that's why I appreciate this film so much.

No, it's not really good. It has many flaws. But it's a childhood memory, that I share with my sister, and with my best friend. And this is my tribute to it.

2) Movie you vow to never watch.

Fillum, jo tum kabhi nahin dekhogi, kasam se.

There are a lot, but there also a lot that I watched without reason, leaving me feel like a complete  lunatic, because I watched them (Army, Yeh Lamhe Judaai Ke, Azaad...). 

But I'm sure I'll never watch Naughty @ 40. There's no reason for doing so whatsoever. 

... Yes, I'm not a fan of Govinda. He can be fun, but he can also be a total mess.

3) Movie that literally left you speechless.
Fillum, jisne tumhe sachmuch avaak chod diya hai.

Just like in my World Edition, while my choice for the first answer isn't a true favorite, the choice for this answer is.

Dil Se is a film I can watch over and over again, it will never fail to impress me. I think that it was one of Shahrukh's best, best performances until know, same for Manisha Koirala and even Preity Zinta ("even", because her part was so small). I never understood, why Manisha was waisted in so many other productions, but rumor has it, that this was also her choice.
The whole film is so close to perfect, and almost all of its contributors are genuine favorites of mine today (music director A. R. Rahman, director Mani Ratnam - just to name a few...).

4) Movie you always recommend.
Fillum, jiska tum hamesha sifarish karti ho.

Not many (read: maybe one) of my friends watch Bollywood from time to time, and if they do, then mostly the "old" films we watched, when we were younger (Chalte Chalte, Main Hoon Na, Kal Ho Naa Ho etc.). However, if I had to recommend one Bollywood film to all my friends, I would probably recommend Luck By Chance. 


I watched it with one of my friends, and she really liked it (except for the many songs). It's the kind of film that many people will like, because it's not too commercial nor boring, not too serious and political, and not too filmy and kitschy.








5) Actor/actress you always watch, no matter how crappy the movie.
Actor/actress, jisse tum hamesha dekh rahi ho, yadhyapi fillum bakvaas hai.

Seriously?

Let's have a guess, I think it's... Hm... Hard to tell...
Forgot his name...

King of Bollywood, King Khan, Baadshah of Bollywood (same as the first, but koi baat nahin), The Rukhster...

SHAH RUKH KHAN! 









6) Actor/actress you don't get the appeal for.
Actor/ actress, jiska tum appeal nahin samajh sakti ho.

I have to be honest: every - single - role I saw her in, she completely failed.

Surely, it wasn't hard to get through Om Shanti Om without anyone noticing she only had a face but no acting skills, but after Bachna Ae Haseeno, I definitely had enough of it. Sadly, I still watched Love Aaj Kal. Shouldn't have done so.

Deepika, I don't know what you did in acting school - and I don't even think I want to know. Just please don't make any more films.

I'll rather watch Katrina Kaif struggling to receive some decent reviews, than you.







7) Actor/actress, living or dead, you'd love to meet.
Actor/actress, manda ya zinda, jisse tum bahut milna chahti ho.

Sorry Raj Kapoor, you came really close, but I've only seen very few of your films, and He is... well, He's my idol. No, more, much more.
If Shahrukh is the King of Bollywood, then He's the God of Bollywood.

AMITABH BACHCHAN-JI. 


Iconic.
(And after Slumdog Millionaire, even the Western world slowly seems to "detect" him).


8) Sexiest actor/actress you've seen. (Picture required!)
Sabse sexy actor/actress, jisse tumne dekhaa hai.
A hard one, because with most actors I feel that they look very different from film to film. Take Hrithik Roshan: Hot in Kites, but Mujhse Dosti Karoge? Not quite.
Or Shahid Kapoor: Fida - fail. Kaminey - wouw!
Secondly, I feel there's a lack of sexy young actors. And thirdly, none of the actors are just really, really, incredibly sexy.

Except for Shah Rukh maybe - when he was younger. Nowadays, I must say that he has grown away from me. Not only in age, but also, I just don't find him quite attractive anymore, personally. I mean, yes, I can see he is attractive, but it just doesn't appeal to me anymore, in his newer films.

Whatever, here are the sexiest characters I've seen:

Siddhart in Rang De Basanti (didn't find a better picture, this one is kinda not-sexy, and he doesn't look like himself).

Vivek Oberoi in Saathiya - again, no better picture

Saif Ali Khan in Parineeta

Shah Rukh in Dil Se - now this is a good picture. Except it's an animation.

Wow, now I got going, I can think of so many. Anyways, I'll stop at this point - as I already said in the World Edition, we don't want Blogger to get cracked again.

9) Dream cast.
Tere sapnon kaa cast.


Shahrukh, Preity, Saif.
Oh, and Amitabh should've been in it - you do know what I'm talking about, don't you?

Yeah, I had to quote Atonement. And by that tell you that Kal Ho Naa Ho is my dream-casted film. Except for Amitabh (who's not in it).


10) Favorite actor pairing.
Sabse favorite jodi.

Forever and always Preity + Saif.

Why aren't they making films together anymore?

You were perfect together...















11) Favorite movie setting.
Sabse favorite setting.

No comment.

By the way; Yes, many NRI-films are good. But there are too many of the bad ones/ too many in general.

12) Favorite decade for movies.
Sabse favorite fillum kaa dashak.
Right now.
Which is similar too: Every decade.
I like all of it. Perhaps I don't watch all of it (yet), but every decade needs attention and appreciation.
Just remember, that it has all been "right now" once. And also remember, that "right now" will be "back then" sometime.

13) Chick flick or action movie?
Chick-flick yaa action movie?

I've only seen one good Indian chick-flick (Aisha), so without doubt, I'll go with Chulbul...













14) Hero, villain or anti-hero?
Hiiro, villain yaa aintay hero?
As much as I love, love, love villains, Bollywood often has its problem with them: many of them are either embarrassing to a villain-fan, or hilarious.

The hero is not any better: either embarrassing, or hilarious. Well, or boring.

So regarding this multi-faceted problem, I'm going to choose the aintay-hero, which is what Bollywood is best at (at the moment).

We'll never know if he was intended to be an aintay-hero, but he most certainly is: Shah Rukh in Darr.

15) Black and white or color?
Kaala-safed yaa rangiin?


To this, I can only write, what I already wrote in my World Edition:
As much as I love black and white, it's more of a "snack" to me. Something you need once in a while, but you couldn't live on it.

And that's the end of it.

Hope you had fun!

Thank you for reading,

Mette M. K.

PS: Some small Hindi-flaws have been corrected.

Fifteen Movie Questions Meme - World Edition

Jack L. made me notice this blog, hosting this blogging meme.

Instantly, I decided I'd do this, also because I do have time left today (I wrote yesterday, that I didn't).
But you know me, I have to make two versions of this; a world and an Indian one. I couldn't imagine doing it differently.

So here are my answers to the 15 Movie Questions Meme, World Edition.

1) Movie you love with a passion.

It has to be Dirty Dancing. I couldn't live without it. Of course, it's not the best film ever made, and it's not my favorite film of all time (I have several of those, couldn't choose one), but I can honestly and truly say, that I love this movie. With a passion.










2) Movie you vow to never watch.

That would probably be Jackass 3D. Sorry, but I'm not really into this s***-humor.

Many people I don't particularly like (and let's not talk about their taste of films), loved this film, which is another reason for me, not to watch it.

Otherwise, I think I'd see anything.











3) Movie that literally left you speechless

Atonement.

(This is supposed to be the "speechless" part).















4) Movie you always recommend.

I really don't have an answer to that question. The people I talk to about movies are so different - and how wouldn't they, if I'm talking about movies every day, to every person I can? So, logically, they have a very different taste for films, and I don't recommend one "special" film everyone likes to all of them.

I decided, therefore, to answer this question with the film that was recommended to me the last time:
Winter's Bone. I liked it very much.

5) Actor/actress you always watch, no matter how crappy the movie.

No one else, but Jackie Chan, would make me watch a film that has received the worst reviews ever. No matter how crappy the movie, it can never be genuine crap with him in it.

That doesn't mean I watch all of his films. But there are actually no actors or actresses outside of Bollywood, that I would try to watch all movies of.

More likely directors...










6) Actor/actress you don't get the appeal for.

Incredibly unsympathetic.

Not seen many of Gwyneth Paltrow's films - but that's not the reason why I don't like her.
















7) Actor/actress, living or dead, you'd love to meet.

My hero, Marlon Brando.

I think I've only seen three of his films, but that's enough to already be crazy about him.
















8) Sexiest actor/actress you've seen. (Picture required!)
This is a tie between James McAvoy, Robert Pattinson (yes, I do now, how typical and teeny-like that last one is, but I wanted to be totally honest) and James Franco.

He did have some weird roles, or roles that were looking weird, but that just makes me realize how hot he really is, when I watch one of his "better" roles. 

I heard Robbie is now officially a good actor? Whatever, I don't care if he is, I just care about his looks.

Sometimes I wonder, if he's gay... I mean, have you seen "Milk"? Well, I don't care anyhow.

And yes, I do realize they all resemble James Dean (except for James McAvoy). I was going to choose him as well, but there'd be an over-saturation of hotness here. And James'es.
We don't want Blogger to delete posts another time, do we?

Aaron Johnson was really hot too, once, but not anymore. And he married a 40 year old woman, so I don't like him anymore. I also didn't like his latest film.

9) Dream cast.

Mads Mikkelsen, Kate Winslet, Marlon Brando, Juliette Binoche.

10) Favorite actor pairing.

Going with the classic example for incredible on-screen-chemistry: Kate and Leo.

By the way, isn't that picture cute?

11) Favorite movie setting.

I like fantasy places (I think I did mention, that I'm a fantasy freak concerning books, didn't I? Not as much in movies, because a lot can go wrong here, but if they're good, I'm mad about fantasy movies.).

Avatar

The Lord of the Rings

Harry Potter

12) Favorite decade for movies.

No one in particular. I haven't watched tons of old films, but I don't really think they're all better than today, if I'm able to judge here. The best ones have been remembered and recommended a thousand times, but there must have been millions of bad ones as well, so I think it's been almost the same situation as today.

Of course, some people might still have their favorite decades, but I personally don't.

13) Chick flick or action movie?

Please don't ask me to choose between breakfast and dinner.

Action movies are mostly the better films, but I, as a girl, still need my chick-flicks in between.

14) Hero, villain or anti-hero?

I'm with the villains here. 

I do like my anti-heroes, and even heroes, but villains have always fascinated me, since I was little. 

Mostly, when we have to play theatre or make a short film in school, I'll play the villain. It just comes so naturally...

No, honestly, the dark, really really dark side of people is one of the most intriguing and interesting things to philosophize about, to me.

15) Black and white or color?

As much as I love black and white, it's more of a "snack" to me. Something you need once in a while, but you couldn't live on it. 

Wow, that was really fun. 

I'll be back with my Indian Edition, some time this weekend.

(And I have plenty of time because... we don't have school next week! Yeah!)

Thank you for reading,

Mette M. K.

The Weekual Thursday PP: Luv, Luv - and even more Luv!

THE 6TH WEEKUAL THURSDAY PP

This week's news feature has been pre-dated to today, because I don't have any time at all tomorrow and on Friday. And posting it on Saturday would be pretty lame, I thought.

By the way, I watched a very interesting, good film in class today: "The Graduate" from 1967. Simon and Garfunkel are great - how could I not realize that before? Aw, I love classics... I should watch more of them.

Oh, and someone voted for me at the LAMMYs for Best Design and Best New LAMB. But I didn't expect more votes - after all, this is more of a "niche blog". And in the end, it's all about the fun in blogging.

Now, a look on this weeks releases... Oh, only one? 

Well, that doesn't matter, unless... 

Its title is misspelled.
But then again, Rahul Bose is in it - an excuse?

KUCCH LUV JAISAA

Director: Barnali Ray Shukla (debuting but wrote story for... Thodi Life Thoda Magic ???)

THEATRICAL TRAILER

My impression, after watching the trailer, is that KLJ will be a rather mainstream entertaining film, but one that I'd be more likely to see than "I Hate Luv Storys" or "Luv Ka the End". Why? Because of Rahul Bose.

Apart from the misspelling, three things are annoying me: 

1) The black-white shots in between (= stylish? Naaa...)

2) The scheme-like characters (house wife, boring husband and secret, but tender in the core love interest)

and 3) Story seems weird, somehow.

I wouldn't necessarily watch it, but it might be fun.

A little. In the Sex and the City 2 kind of way.

And just like some other blogger (I think it was that girl from Cinema Paradox), I should be practicing for my math test... But I don't feel like. Just feel like sitting in front of the laptop and practicing some Swedish and Spanish... But I think I should do math now.

Thank you for reading,

Mette M. K.

The Weekual Thursday PP: Misspellings, guns n' boxes

Dear Blogger,

I think the best way to express my feelings is with this song:

After squeezing in the task of writing my weekual posty-post, between practicing for choir and for ballet, you deleted my post! You don't know what this means to me, right? You don't know, how little time I have at the moment, and that thursday is a very busy date (!!!) for katten/fanden/satan da, sgu!!!

All right, after swearing in Danish (I don't want this blog to be polluted by the vulgar English swear words), I can now take my time to write, what I already wrote on Thursday:

This Thursday (rhmr: Saturday), the Weekual Thursday PP is celebrating its 1-month-anniversary:

THE 4TH WEEKUAL THURSDAY PP

A sad aspect is, that I now don't have any time/ energy left, to participate in Madhuri Week with more than my current two posts. But I'm looking forward to tomorrow, when Gaja Gamini will list all contributing posts on her blog.

I also wanted to say, that yes, I have checked out some of the ratings for the three films releasing to... yesterday, but I haven't read any review yet, so my opinion is only half-influenced.

Whatever, let's take a look on Friday (the 13th, hehehe) 's releases, which include 3 new-coming directors' works:

Another bland-looking misspelling/ Amrita-ka-the-final-end

Most promising child-film for a long time

M & M's mixed with "Love, Sex aur Dhokha" - interesting...

The guns n' Nanas - awesome.

Love U... Mr. Kalakaar!

Director: S. Manasvi (debuting)

THEATRICAL TRAILER

It's such a shame that Amrita Rao is wasting her talent again and again. 

The trailer looks bland, uninteresting and unoriginal.

Not even the drawings are new - they look very Hum Tum to me, hai na?

In Katy Perry's "Ur So Gay", I could just look away from that misspelling, but I quite like the song - and I don't like the trailer from this film, so that's a different situation. At least they spelt Love right.

But has anyone got a English dictionary in Mumbai at all? 

Stanley ka Dabba

Director: Amole Gupte (debuting)

THEATRICAL TRAILER

It's only the Creative Director - but anyone from the Taare Zameen Par crew is someone I have confidence in for making a good child film.

Stanley ka Dabba looks fun, original and much better than "Zokkomon" (which I talked about in a previous edition).

The poster is kept simple, just as the trailer, and the combination of both make me want to hear more about "Stanley's lunch box".

Ragini MMS

Director: Pawan Kripalani (debuting)

THEATRICAL TRAILER

Looks a bit like "Paranormal Activity" to me, but I haven't seen that one yet, so I'm not the one to decide about how far it is inspired by the Hollywood Superhit.

All I can say is, that this seems to bear all potential to become the best Indian Horror flick by far - not that it's hard to do so, but it really looks promising.

I am personally a big fan of Horror films, even the bad ones - they're just so much fun! Oh, I love them, I just love them...

Perhaps, I'm even looking more forward to this one, than to Shagird...

Shagird

Director: Tigmanshu Dhulia (Haasil/ Charas)

THEATRICAL TRAILER

Considering the fact that Dhulia is releasing approximately 8 (!) films this year, I really hope he worked hard on each one, and that it was pure coincidence they all are released in the same year (you know, long production time etc.).

Just by listening to the melody in the trailer, I get excited for this film. 

Ah, can you feel the cold metal in your hand, can you sense the smell of dark humour mixed with the flavour of Delhi - and can you hear this Western-y soundtrack in your background?

I do.

------------------------------------------------

Let's hope that Blogger warns us next time they decide to burn off thousands of posts, and otherwise: be sure to check out Gaja Gamini's list of Madhuri-Week-posts tomorrow.
Oh, and to the Europeans amongst us: don't vote for Germany tonight - so embarrassing they chose the same singer as last year (and the song is not good at all).

Thanks for reading,
Mette M. K.

Madhuri. What else?

Gaja Gamini from Bollywood-ish Blog, who (as we all know) is deeply in love with Madhuri, started this thing called "Madhuri Week". This week celebrates Madhuri's 44th birthday on Sunday.

Picture of Madhuri from the 44th page of google pictures (!)

As I said before, I don't have that much time this month, but I will be trying to contribute with more than one single post. 

Keeping that on mind, my first post will simply be about the films I've seen with Madhuri until now, in the order of which one I like most:

5

Dil (1990) 

I do like "Dil", it's not a bad film - but I just don't remember much about it. All I do remember is, that Madhu is the cool girl in school, and Aamir is the cool guy in school, and they don't like each other to begin with. Then there's a kiss sometime... And that's all.

4

Hum Tumhare Hain Sanam (2002) 

This film is also not one I watch very frequently, even though I'll always remember the soundtrack. Just by reading the film title, the title song will start swirling around in my head. But is it a good film... Why don't I remember? I do remember, that Salman's amount of hair is changing during the film, because it had a production time of almost 10 years. And off course I remember the story...

And the song "Aa Gaya, Aa Gaya...". Yeah, that's it.

3

Dil To Pagal Hai (1997) 

One of those ultimate romantic-switzerland-honey-dripping 90s blockbusters... Even though it's starring Shahrukh-how-could-I-not-love-you-Khan, I must rank this behind "Aaja Nachle". Might be, because I've not seen it very often, or because I've seen "Aaja Nachle" more recently - I cannot say.

Maybe it's due to my love-hate-relationship to 90s' Bollywood.

Let's face it: seen from a cinematic and intellectual angle, most 90s Bollywood films are terrible - even the hyped ones (except for DDLJ and some others). But then again: sometimes you just need a burger instead of the spinach-casserole, right?

2

Aaja Nachle (2007)

Madhuri's comeback film had it all: entertaining plot (and at least more realistic than a certain "fearless" Salman-flick), perceived supporting actors, groovy soundtrack - and last but not least Madhuri in her best shape. Nevertheless, it became a flop. Why? Well, we'll never really find out (though many, many bollywood-fans have wracked their brains about this question).

I watched the film with my dear granny, and it was perfect. The perfect granny-grandaughter-happy-film. We had so much fun. Then, I watched it one more time, alone.

And it was still fun!

1

Devdas (2002) 

Devdas. What else?

We've all experienced re-watching a film that we loved at the first sight - and when we watched it for the second time, it turned out to be not as magical as at first instance. 

The opposite, though, does not happen very often: re-watching a film that you've only seen once, a long time ago - and realizing how mind-blowing it really is (and has always been, but you had forgotten).

That's what happened when I watched "Devdas" for the second time in my life, yesterday.

--------------------------------

Honestly, I don't think that my choice for the best film is ever going to change, no matter how many (good) Madhuri films I will watch. I do realize, that I haven't seen many of her films, and also not the best ones, probably. But perhaps Madhuri Week will make some of my favorite bloggers produce some posts about her great don't-miss-it films, and thereby inspire me to pay more attention the the (mostly older) films of Miss-Magic-Madhuri.

There is one more DVD in my newly bought DVD-suitcase, that I'm definitely going to watch this week: "Koyla". That's going to be fun - I might be blogging about it.

Thank you for reading,

Mette M. K.

The Weekual Thursday PP: Haunted Love

THE 3RD WEEKUAL THURSDAY PP

I haven't got much time right now, because we need to do a lot for school and so on, so that's why I'm not posting as frequently as otherwise. I'm sorry for that, but off course I will stick to writing your Weekual Thursday PP (though I wont write as much as I usually do).

So here's we have of new releases for tomorrow:

India's First Stereoscopic 3D film... by known-to-make-many-bad-films Vikram Bhatt...

And (I know I stole that line from someone): Yash Raj Ka the End... by some "Bumpy" (?)

Haunted 3D
Director: Vikram Bhatt (Elaan/ Raaz)

THEATRICAL TRAILER

The only film of Vikram Bhatt I've seen is Ghulam. I was 10 years or so then, so I don't remember much else than Rani, Aamir, some catchy tunes - and a lot of blood and disgusting dishoom scenes.

Haunted, honestly, looks like some very bad collage of the "best" scenes from Hollywood Horror hits, and the scary part seems to be those where we hear a woman screaming. Which is, like, 20 times (only in the trailer).

I'm not familiar with the actors, but what I've seen of the leading actor is not what I call promising. The woman, I think, is only supposed to be beautiful and able to scream.









Luv Ka the End
Director: Bumpy (debuting with this one)

THEATRICAL TRAILER


Look, I have this problem with film titles that are misspelled. I haven't seen "I Hate Luv Storys" (= I Hate Love Stories) yet, only because of its title.
So, you see that this is the first wall between my and "Luv Ka the End".

The other one is the actress, who has some similarity with Amrita Rao, but a much squeakier voice.

And I also find the trailer very fake. It just... it doesn't look fun. It doesn't look genuine, but more like some very through-thought commercial teeny production, that is supposed to make YR films look younger and more successful.








In a nutshell: If I were in India, I'd either go shopping for some DVDs, or watch some of the older releases I haven't seen yet.