Posts tagged ‘Rakesh Bedi’

February 27, 2011

Afsana Pyar Ka (1991)

*Starring Neelam’s Hair!*

When I began watching Hindi films in 2002 or so, many of the first ones I saw were from the 1990s. And yet still—I persisted! I was charmed! I guess it was all so shiny and new that I didn’t know or care how hackneyed or obnoxious the plots were and the OTT use of wind machines and light filters merely fascinated me. “Look! her hair is blowing wildly inside her house!” “Oooh! A thousand points of light!” etc. Plus the people (Aamir, Shahrukh, Kajol, Rani) were so very good-looking and the girls had such glossy, glossy long hair. But none of them were a patch on Neelam in that department.

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August 24, 2008

Chashme Buddoor (1981)

This movie made me laugh so hard that I literally cried, and had to pause it so as not to miss anything. Apart from the two Munnabhai films, it’s the funniest (intentionally) Hindi movie I’ve ever seen (and I’ve seen plenty). Comedy is the hardest genre to translate across cultures, but this one does it in spades. I would say in fact that it’s got to be one of the funniest films ever made anywhere, period, and is as close to perfect as anything gets.

The tongue-in-cheek celebration of filmi conventions, romance, student life, and friendship is hilarious; and the characters are portrayed so perfectly sweetly and heartwarmingly that you can’t help but love them, even when they do bad things. The cast is superb: Farooq Sheikh and Deepti Naval (whom I enjoyed immensely in Kissise Na Kehna and Katha) get incomparable support from Saeed Jaffrey, Ravi Baswani and Rakesh Bedi. I run short of superlatives!

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