It had been a long time since I saw a good horror movie.
REC is a brilliant horror/thriller movie. It is about a TV crew recording about the life of a firefighter.
DO NOT READ BEYOND THIS IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN THE MOVIE. JUST KNOW THAT IT IS A MUST WATCH MOVIE. GET A COPY WITH ENGLISH SUBTITLES, CREATE AMBIENCE FOR A HORROR MOVIE – Lights Off, Volume Levels High and Preferably sitting alone! – AND WATCH IT
The movie is about a TV crew recording the life of a firefighter and gets trapped in an infected house. The infection is contagious and spreads through saliva. The TV crew thought they were being brave before they found themselves trapped amongst zombies. Then it was just a run for their lives. With the building sealed by Police from outside and the house full of zombies, they did not have any option but to shit in their pants (not literally). The camera from TV crew is all we have.
The ambience, soundtrack and the screams make it a perfect horror flick.
Do watch it if you haven’t seen it yet.
The movie earns a rating of 4 on 5 – Must Watch!
January 11, 2009
Posted by
abhitaneja |
2007, Good Ratings, Hollywood, Movie review |
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1 Comment
Swagat hai aapka kaun banega Crorepati dwitya mein!
Aur ye raha 2 crore rupaiye ke liye aapka sawaal…
The above two lines are no strange to Indian audience.. Amitabh Bachchan did it first and then Shahrukh Khan followed but now Anil Kapoor does the same although not on TV but on the larger screen. He plays host of the show: “Who wants to be a millionaire” (English translation of Kaun Banega Crorepati).
No one would have thought that someone will make a full movie on a TV show but British director Danny Boyle found an opportunity to make a brilliant masterpiece keeping the TV show in background. The movie has already won several awards in the selected limited screenings it has had so far.
The movie is basically about a kid from slums of Mumbai managing to get a berth in the show “Who wants to be a millionaire” and the events that follow. The kid was arrested for a probable case of fraud/cheating as no one expected the kid to advance to the final levels. This suspicion prompted the show host to call for an enquiry, where the kid (referred to as Slumdog in the movie) takes the police inspector (played by Irrfan Khan) through his life and how an illiterate kid from slums of Mumbai knew answers to the questions that even literates might find dicey at times.
The movie takes you through life of a slumdog through a series of events. It is basically like walking through the tragedies of life of a slumdog without having that thrown directly at face. The changeovers between the TV show and the life are so subtle that you at times even forget about the show running in background.
In all this drama and action, the movie also conveys a message of “Never give up” in a very profound manner. The quest of finding her girlfriend never ended for the slumdog despite the challanges and problems he faced!
Although the storyline of the movie is not very strong so as to say but the magnificent screenplay and excellent direction makes this movie a brilliant watch. I am yet to find a person who did not like this movie.
No suprises, the movie scores 4.5 on 5 and is highly recommended.
January 11, 2009
Posted by
abhitaneja |
2008, Bollywood, Good Ratings, Hollywood, Movie review |
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No Comments Yet
The world is on the verge of end but there is someone in the world who w
ould not let this happen. He makes his family safe and himself goes against the odds to save the world. He tries..fails. Then suddenly something makes him realise that he was almost correct and he finds the solution, sometimes minutes before he dies or sometimes being alive.
The Story:
The above theme has been used in God knows how many movies and the new release “I am Legend” is no different. The protagonist(Dr. Neville), played by Will Smith, who is a scientist and a soldier, decides to save/revive the city of New York from the incurable virus that has spread in the city. The virus has made living beings violent and the skin is prone to melting by Ultraviolet rays, which makes it impossible for infected people to get out in the sunlight. This is the time, when Dr. Neville gets out in the open to gather basic requirements and subjects for experiments from the city. He is carrying out experiments in his laboratory in the basement of his house, where he performs tests on rats (and later humans). He gets disappointed with all the results failing to make any impact and just then he realises that one of his subject rats shows lesser signs of violence. He captures a living human and performs the same test on him just to realise that the test does not works for humans. He is disappointed. The next day he gets trapped and while escaping it starts getting dark. The infected animals attack him and his dog. The dog saves him but itself gets infected. Doctor has to kill it and loses his mind.
Next night, he goes out in open at night. All these zombie-type humans attack him. He kills some but they are too many in number. He is trapped.
Some lady comes and saves him. But the infected people get to know Dr. Neville’s place and they attacked him the next day. While hiding from them, he finds out that the experiment on humans has been successful. He hands over the solution to the lady and makes him leave.
He dies. Humans saved. Movie ends.
The movie succeeds in engaging people till last 10-15 minutes where the director fails miserably to contain the excitement built up so far. The ending sequence seems being fitted forcibly to the movie and it actually ruins the movie in whole. Further movie doesn’t even try to explain how come Dr. Neville gets immune to the virus, while there is no other individual in the city unaffected?? How come all the basic services (electricity/water etc.) still in place although no individual is left to work??
Even if we ignore these questions, the last 15 minutes are not anything to let go easily.
Unlike Aaja Nachle, where despite no excitement you come out happy after the movie, here you come out feeling sorry for your decision to spend 150 bucks on such a movie.
Overall movie gets 2 stars out of 5
Positives:
- Will Smith
- Well directed..a few fancy sequences
- Well carried movie theme till last 15 minutes
- Effective use of sound effects
Negatives:
- Last 15 minutes ruined all the above positives
- The two questions (raised above) left unattempted
Recommendation:
There are a lot of movies on the same theme and you must have seen atleast a couple of them and you may like to skip this one.
December 17, 2007
Posted by
abhitaneja |
2007, Average Ratings, Hollywood, Movie review |
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No Comments Yet
Originally Posted at Abhi’s Space
It is not a new movie but I had not seen it then.
I had heard a lot about it but watching it was really a different experience.
“Sierra Leone,1999
Civil war rages for control of the diamond fields.
Thousands have died and Millions have become refugees.
None of whom has ever seen a diamond.”
The people are innocent. They have never seen a diamond. To them, it is just another white piece of stone but they are still being killed for it. Children are doped and trained to take lives…to help fighting in struggle for motherland!! (something which is already yours!) All foreigners are our enemies!!(Is there any rational at all!)
And all this just to make some money..OK a lot of money.. but is it still worth the cause!! On one hand we claim of distributive effect of money (poor benefits from rich getting richer) and this is what rich do to get more richer!!
Greed is such a vice that it can make any rational human being do such pathetic acts.
I appreciate the director/producer’s effort to bring up the issue to public..and I agree to my friend’s words, “Movies are biggest source of learning after Reading”.
The closing message of the movie was not just a mere consolation but also a warning. This needs to be stopped..at least for the sake of humanity.
“In January 2003, forty nations signed “The Kimberley Process”–an effort to stem the flow of conflict diamonds.
But illegal diamonds still find their way to market.
It is up to the consumer to insist that a diamond is conflict-free.
Sierra Leone is at peace.
But there are still 200,000 child soldiers in Africa”
Stop smuggling Blood Diamonds.
Stop selling Blood Diamonds.
Stop buying Blood Diamonds.
I suggest Ban the company even if a single case in this regard is reported..The world wont be any different without the Diamonds but the presence of diamonds is making such a big difference!!
December 17, 2007
Posted by
abhitaneja |
2006, Good Ratings, Hollywood, Movie review |
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No Comments Yet
ould not let this happen. He makes his family safe and himself goes against the odds to save the world. He tries..fails. Then suddenly something makes him realise that he was almost correct and he finds the solution, sometimes minutes before he dies or sometimes being alive.
