This year’s Diwali came with much anticipation for all of us, especially for the Wife: We were finally going to get to watch Om Shanti Om and Saawariya. The Day couldn’t come sooner. The marketers of the movie were in overdrive, advertising the movie like crazy. It was almost like they wanted everyone to go and watch the movie on the first day itself, before anyone had time to publish reviews. Now why would they do that?
Finally the Diwali day came, and we rushed through the unimportant things – like doing the pooja and bursting crackers – and drove right to the theater. And there we stood, with 300 of our fellow movie lovers (read: poor, confused souls) eagerly awaiting to see Shahrukh’s 6-pack. Three hours later, I was a changed man!
Om Shanti Om is the most confused movie of the year. It’s almost like the scriptwriters took the scripts of some 4-5 old hindi movies, stuffed them along with some crackers, burst the scripts to pieces. Then, they sent out some interns to interview buffaloes on the topic of punarjanm till they had a 2-hour long movie. And then, half-way through the movie, they lost this script, so they put a 20-minute song, which is really an attendance call of bollywood’s so-called stars, which adds absolutely nothing to the already non-existent story line. They also recorded an old woman coughing like crazy, added some bits of drums, and passed it off as the background music. But most importantly, Shahrukh Khan delivers a drunk-monkey like performance in the first half, followed by a schizophrenic-with-one-personality-angry-with-the-other performance in the second half. The only saving grace of this movie is the ending – The realization that the movie is over and you are now a free man once more is worth a lot more that the value of the ticket.
Of course, my happiness was short lived, because we went to watch Sawariya soon afterwards.
To say Saawariya is a crappy movie would not be correct. Horrendously Ridiculous comes close, but it doesn’t really capture the essence of the absurdity that this movie is. After watching this movie I felt like tying up Sanjay Leela Bansali alone in a room, forcing him to watch a cockroach chase a spider round-and-round a water fountain for 3 hours. That too in blue light. Because seriously, that’s what this entire movie is. It’s two grossly untalented kids, who probably got kicked out of college for lack of attendance and ended up on this set to spend the rest of the day. And for the love of God, I can’t figure out why the whole movie is in blue! Maybe the director was trying to get every frame half-black half-blue so that the WinZip compression would work better to save some electrons, what with all the global warming and all. That’s the best explanation I could come up with, because nothing else can explain the lack of daylight (or plain light, for that matter) in this movie.
Sawaariya is one long song with some breaks for dialog. And by dialog I mean girly giggling by the chic and some punch-me-in-the-face expressions accompanied by pig-like grunting by the hero. One wonders if all the actors are the props and the set is the real star in this movie. I came really close to concluding that the bridge-over-the-fake-river is the central star of the movie, because everyone of the other actors looks like they were made of rock. And the rocks had moss growing over them. And the rocks were painted blue.
I have only a splitting headache to show after watching these two movies. But I would recommend both movies to all of you. Sharing your suffering and pain, they say, makes the healing process faster.
Amazing post!!!
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I feel really sorry for you..sitting through both the movies!
I am sorry dude but you are a logically inclined brain….and your lack of appreciation for art and its nuances shows up in your writing about Saawariya. It is not a commercial movie and I think SLB is wasting his energy trying to educate the masses…..
It is not a commercial Movie? Oh, What about the constant advertising, the incessant Saawariyaaa Oooo Saawariyaaaa promos on TV, the big budget TV commercials? Those don’t count, I presume?
Dude no mention of Deepika, u deserve to go to hell rather (forced to watch both the movies all the 3 shows
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Mount Carmel Girl ;;
what if rakhi sawant was the female lead in both the movies, would it have helped?
Deepika Padkone is OK and all, but seriously, you can’t beat Rakhi Sawant. She would have bought Glamour and Color into these inspid movies.
If these two were Rakhi Sawant movies, I’d have stood in line to watch them First Day First Show
speaking of rakhi sawant, did u happen to see her in the new ad??
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxfVWt2cRJM
please give a review of this rather than boring stuff like OSO and saawariya!! [:P]
Bravo Bravo.. OSO and “Saawariya” back to back!! u rock
Keep wondering if the film makers ever watch the movie at all after completion
Guess not.. if they do….. then no need for any explanation about their perception for sense 
Firstly, great review! N congrats on being another saawariya survivor..I haven’t watched OSO yet, n so I’ll refrain from commenting on that.
@c e e d y -NOT a commercial movie?? Please define commercial movies to me..please..I would like to increase my knowledge.
N I wish ppl would stop calling people like us the “masses”..even SLB said that his “movie” would not appeal to the masses..to which my mom said “r we the masses? I mean we’re well educated n watch serious films” to which my dad retorted “we r not masses, we r asses-for watching it”!
Regards,
‘lost the will to watch movies’ girl
@naren: Yeah, it requires guts to commit to back-to-back movies like that. Movie makers are a lot like Software Programmers. They don’t do a good job oftesting their own programs, so you need a special QA dept.
@sac: The new Rakhi Sawant ad is great, isn’t it? I think I’ll write a whole blog post about it.
@anon: I’m glad I could persuade you from not watching the movie
That’s my good deed for the day 
loved the post
Great post.
) Espcially the Saawariya review. It is hilarious, but you didn’t get the humor in OSO? I feel sorry for you. For someone so funny, you have no sense of humor. I myself enjoyed it immensely. 
Brilliant reviews!!! The reviews are far more entertaining than the movies themselves, which is uh… not saying much actually. What I REALLY mean, is these reviews made my day! Great job!
you need to have a sense of humor to understand Om Shanti Om. obviously, you don’t have one. i thought it was the best movie, and everyone should watch it. also, you spelled dialogue wrong. so go learn english before criticizing others.
@ Rajiv,
Like you said, I enjoyed this review much better than the movie !!!
Om Shanti Om was a brilliant movie. For a lot of it, you have to understand the phrase ‘tongue in cheek’ and also appreciate the aspect of entertainment that the entertainment industry should deliver. This movie was a colourful delight, and although it certainly won’t go down as the deepest film of the season, it will certainly sit up there as, if not the most, one of the most entertaining films. I hold these beliefs so strongly that I paid to see it twice at the cinemas (here in Australia) and also bought a blackmarket copy until the genuine version is released.
Well, like they say, “One man’s nectar is another man’s poison”
You Rock! Awesome post
[...] to try to avoid watching movies. The wife is a big movie buff, and she drags me along to watch ALL movies. Her theory is that watching movies together helps us “connect and rejuvenate” our [...]
hey,
i know its too late to comment on any of the movies.. (btw i could nt watch OSO till end, like any other SRK movie for that matter…) but could not stop laughing on your WinZip point…