Producer: ABCL
Director: Virender Raaj Anand
*ing: Amitabh Bachchan, Nafisa Ali, Ajay Devgan, Sonali Bendre
Music: Anand Raaj Anand

Released on : June 26, 1998

Reviewed by: Anjali Abrol
dilwaliji@indolink.com

out of 

Amitabh dies... Yeah, that is the beginning of the movie. He dies. I think it was supposed to bring on suspense.

Basically, a loafer rebel named Varendra (Ajay Devgan) is forced to join the military with the 'Major Saab', Jasbir Sing Rana (who else but Amitabh could have such a name!).... and to sum up, the most appropriate song for these two would be Betaabi's (ahem) hit song, Don't Take a Panga... they love each other from the start. 'Mother' Doctor Priya (Nafisa Ali) is the Major Saab's wife and really nice to Veeru when he comes to hang out in the military hospital every other minute.

Veeru, on the other hand, is an idiot. He finds a badly-dressed ditz named Sonali Bendre, harasses her... no, he molests her, and that too in her own bedroom, and manages to write 'I love you' twice on the gates of her mansion with the ketchup from his mildly cut lip. That's a lot of blood for a small cut... must've hit an artery. And of course, after that, they fall in love. Romantic, no?

There's some boring conspiracy with some cute lil' villians, one being Ditz's jerk brother, and some old man goes flying off a cliff (the funniest part of the film, for sure. (Too bad it wasn't Ajay) Those lil' guys annoyed me until the end of the movie. Jerk bhai wants Ditz behen to marry Freak's (another villian with terrible red evil eyes) son, Gadha. Meanwhile, Idiot (Veeru) and Godzilla (Amitabh) become like baap beta. How sweet. Sing a couple of stupid songs, blah blah.

Idiot and Godzilla must go to rescue Ditz from Gadha and Freak. Originality prevails. But no! It is the way they go and how they rescue her that kept me at the edge of my seat. They used military weapons and clothes and wore cute lil black caps! (Like we care...!)

The songs... 'Akeli Na Bazaar Jaya Karo' was a stupidly-picturized song with a bhangra-like sprinkle--without the uhhmm uhhmmmm dhol. Blah. (Too bad you can't fastforward songs in a movie theater.) 'Pyar Kiya Tho Nibhana' was a nice, catchy tune, traditional running through the fields (and hoping they will trip) song. 'Himmat Kabhi Na Todenge' looked a lil off (it was an army march song wannabe), especially with Amitabh's gut hanging out, and all these lil skinny pendu geeks barely being able to walk on their twigs, never mind march. 'Sona Sona', I will get to later, when I hit the lil tiny paragraph of good points in the film.

Next, the casting. It was obviously let's-bow-down-to-Amitabh film, but it succeeded in making the crowd want to run away. Nafisa Ali is one of the most beautiful women with actual natural beauty (remember that?), and surpassed even Rekha, Jaya Prada, Sonali, Urmila, Sushmita, Shilpa Shetty. Sonali was just ugh! Ajay was well-disliked.... the biggest miscast... at least that's what it seemed like from the general opinions of the public.

The acting. Uffffff!!! What happened to acting?!?!?! Even the great Amitabh sounded horrible. He was so desperately trying to sound like a military guy that he just ended up with horrible dialogue delivery in a completely fake voice. Nafisa Ali could not get her words out properly.... her dialogue delivery was just like "behtaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa" ...yeesh ! No thanks, just keep the mouth shut and smile your sweet smile, Nafs babe. Ajay and Sonali were just okay, but acting was never a strong point for either one.

The look. Interesting how rubber shoes can make so much noise (like heeled boots) on the floor...or maybe because they were the villain's shoes (meaning the sound engineer chilled out a lil too much). Poor Amitabh's stomach needed a lil corset....Sonali needed better clothes (or clothes, at that), and Amitabh's "muchhe daari" needed the salt and pepper coloring to be evened out (just looking at his "muchhe daari" was funny enough--I spent half the movie trying to see if the exact "muchhe" was put the the same place for each shot--that's how exciting it was). Nothing will help Ajay. Except less hair. Wow! I never knew he had eyes! (his eyes are something to look at). The lil' kiddies I mean cadets needed the look.... I think they had just finished shooting a hijra song from another movie...

The parts. Interesting how people can just jump up and run after being beaten to death. Vah vah, kya taaqat. And vah vah, kya angrezi delivery. Amitabh's best line: "Hay yuhoo! Daarty see-vee-liyan!!!!!!" (Hey you! Dirty civilian!!!!!!). And what was the deal with Amitabh's and the kajal-wala villian's hangover look!? Puh-lease! Ever heard of Visine!? If that had significant meaning (like haan, the villian and Amitabh had a lil too much the night before.....), I think the London crowd just missed it.

The few good parts… Haan, Ajay's friends, like the sardar, added to the tiny bit of intentional humor... and the song, "Sona Sona", was just great! The best part of the film, for sure. It had such a nice Punjabi touch to it. That is, until Amitabh tried a few steps. The crowd just prayed that he wouldn't fall---actually, the audience laughed a lot when Amitabh tried his two-bit step... aside from that, the song was the only highlight of the film.

The audience also seemed to find most of the movie funny, that being due to the horrible dialogue delivery and the cast who seemed not to be able to act to save their lives! The crowd roared when the lil’ old man flipped over the cliff, because it seemed so ridiculous and watching the dummy flip side to side on the cliff lacked convincing. (Can't they even toss a dummy off the cliff properly??!!!) Also, when Amitabh was dying and the doctors were trying to revive him with shocks, they would place the pads on him every second instead of every 10 or 15 seconds....which means that Amitabh was probably revived 20 times but before he could breathe, they shocked him again. Then, amazingly enough, he "died" and when he came back to "life" (after the doctors had just removed a large bullet from his chest), the doctors rushed over and pumped and beat his stomach...uhhmmm and WHY????!!!!! Kya pani pump kar rahe te? UFFFF!!!

General reaction. Even before the movie was over, more than half of the (full house) audience had left (you know the movie's bad when Indians leave before the movie's over). This movie seemed to evoke a lot of discussion afterwards, so I, being the paagal ladki I am, decided to ask random people (meri kya jaati?) what they thought of the movie on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being best.

I got plenty of "Kya bakwaas tha", "Bilkul flop tha, kya bore tha", "Amitabh tho budha ho gaya", "Acting tho bakwaas tha." (these were amongst the better comments). The numbers ranged from -10 to 3, no one (amongst the at least 30 people I asked) gave higher...! I was a bit surprised, I gave it a 4.5. (Just for Amitabh loyalty and his past acting... and knowing that he can indeed act!

Verdict: MAJOR SOB! (and take it as you please!)

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