January 2, 2010
Right up front I have to say that I am in no way objective about this film. Director Raju Hirani is a good friend of mine, and I spent a couple of days on the sets back in March and had a brilliant time interacting with the incredibly smart, funny and friendly cast and crew—including this guy named Karan who spoiled me rotten. All I had to do was *think* about wishing I had some tea, or water, and there he was with whatever it was I was thinking about wanting.
Oh, and I read the script in advance too, because Raju asked me to look at the subtitles so that “bloggers like you won’t make fun of them” (yes, that is a direct quote).
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Posted in Hindi movies |
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November 20, 2008
Here’s another favorite! I remember waiting for this to come out on DVD. I’d read how well it was doing in Indian theaters, I loved the story concept, and it paired Sanjay Dutt with his father Sunil Dutt, who hadn’t acted in sixteen years. I got it as soon as it was available, and I was not disappointed. In fact, I was bowled over.
This is the first Hindi film I ever saw where I actually laughed out loud and was laughing with it (I’d seen Disco Dancer and laughed too, but at it). Keep in mind that it was 2003 and I’d been watching Hindi films for less than a year; the ubiquitous Comic Side Plot still mystified me and I often felt that culturally I must be missing something that prevented me from understanding the humor. I was beginning to despair.
But this—this was a laugh-out-loud cross cultural fiesta with a squishy dil™!
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Posted in Hindi movies |
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May 21, 2008
During a recent exchange with Ramsu, it occurred to me that I devote a lot of time and attention to subtitles—both while watching and while writing about Hindi movies. They are integral to my Hindi cinema experience, the overriding thing being of course that I NEED them. I wish I didn’t, but I do. I have learned to understand basic Hindi, but my brain is such that I will never speak it and understand it fluently unless I live in India for a while.
Believe me, if I could find a practical way to do that, I would—in a heartbeat!
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Posted in Hindi movies, Subtitle delight |
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January 24, 2008
For anyone who doesn’t know, Bollywood Ka Boss is a new Indian television show on the Sahara Filmy channel, hosted by Boman Irani. It’s a Hindi film trivia quiz show, and I was very honored to have them do a special short segment on me: a pagli American girl who essentially has nothing better to do all day but obsess about Hindi movies and retain all kinds of useless information about them.
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Posted in Hindi movies |
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MemsaabStory 