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Ranbeer Talwar(Saif Ali Khan) has pretty much lost everyone he’s loved since he was child. So now he doesn’t have much use for love and relationships in his life. A self made man, his roaring business is his life.

Till his cool BMW rams into a car one evening and kills the Walias leaving their 4 kids orphans.

And then gets saddled with playing guardian to the Walia kids till they are adults….and be good with them or he gets thrown into jail for 20 years.

Which is exactly what the kids want. Bent upon revenge, they make way to Ranbeer’s house to make life hell for him.

A few days in and both Ranbeer and his bimbo girlfriend. Malaika(Ameesha Patel) have had enough and are desperately looking for a nanny for the kids.

Lo behold! God(Rishi Kapoor) decides the perfect way to make life rosy for Ranbeer and the kids is to send Geeta(Rani Mukheerji), an angel who follows no rules and wants to know why humans cry, down to earth to play nanny.

So Geeta rides down a rainbow on a bicycle, changes into a tacky outfit which pretty much works as her nanny uniform n uses plenty of magic(though she isn’t supposed to) to get the kids and Ranbeer together. And make Malaika baby disappear.

Soon all is good but that means that it’s time for Geeta to go back to the heaven and she doesn’t want to. Neither does Ranbeer who’s in love with Geeta. So does God answer Geeta’s prayers and let her stay back?

Not sure if it was intended that way but Thoda Pyaar is strictly for kids and they too might not be too happy with the tacky special effects given they get regular doses of Cartoon Network and Animax.

Kunal Kohli does have a flair for casting kids though. After the adorable Rehaan in Fanna he comes up with a likable bunch who manage to endear without ever getting on your nerves.

Saif Ali Khan barely gets to be alive. Poor guy’s made to whisper in a bid to appear aloof but comes into his element when he gets to bond with the children.

God bless for making Rani Mukherjee an angel who can’t cry. It is certainly pleasant to see her all clear eyed for once! She has a good time bonding with the children and their chemistry shows through.

Did she get Vidya Balan to design her wardrobe though????

Ameesha Patel in a quick cameo excels as a social ladder climbing airhead.

So does Rishi Kapoor…though for God he hardly gets to say a thing

Ok movie but certainly not for adult viewing

Raj Malhotra(Shahid Kapoor) is voted most likely to appear on Time magazine. But that was 5 years ago in college and the architect is still struggling to make his mark in the real world. He’s smart, talented for sure, a hard worker and very earnest but he’s plain unlucky

Desperate, he seeks out the advice of a fortune teller, Haseena Bano Jaan(Juhi Chawla) who convinces him that all he needs is a lucky charm to make his misfortunes flee. Raj’s lucky charm turns out to be Priya(Vidya Balan). Whenever she’s around things go wonderfully well for Raj. So much so that he’s convinced that if she sticks around he and his long time partner and friend, Hiten(Vishal) will land the contract to design a new mall. Sadly though Priya’s bang in the middle of protests against the mall which calls for the demolition of a community centre,

So Raj does the best thing for his career. He lies to Priya and gets her along for the ride so that he can land the contract. But what he doesn’t count on is falling for her.

Can Raj own up and still keep Priya’s love? Will his luck ever turn around?

Kismat Konnection is well….a very Aziz Mirza movie(who returns to direction after a long spell). It has an essentially good hearted hero who sometimes does the stupidest things, a pretty girl he’s in love with who can be too good to be true, a bum chum pal who’ll stick with him through anything and other supporting actors. What it lacks is zing. Something that’ll keep you glued to the screen and have you laughing and crying with Raj. Kismat Konnection doesn’t(at the risk of sounding lame)…..connect.

Shahid Kapoor does a good job as Raj. He’s easy enough. He does slip into SRK mode every once in a while but maybe that’s just the lines. The character Raj Malhotra is pretty much the same SRK played for years

Vidya Balan also does well. A controlled performance. And definitely a wonderful change from Rani’s hysteria. While the clothes are so much better than the ones she wore in Hey Babby they still suck. She really really really needs a new designer or maybe she should simply wear more Indian.

Vishal Seth does a neat job as Raj’s best pal. So do Om Puri as a construction honcho and Boman Irani in a brief but likable appearance.

Juhi’s her likable self.

Time pass this one. DVD watch. Or maybe you can wait for the television premier if you can survive the ad breaks.

Aamir Ali(Rajeev Khandewal) is a doctor. Who’s been in London for years and is finally returning back home to his family.

Only he never gets to see them. As he leaves the airport he is given a cell phone and told to follow the instructions given by the voice on the other end. Or he wont see his family alive again.

Aamir’s journey takes him through the poorest sections of Muslim dominated areas of Mumbai as he battles against time to save his family.

The end of that journey will change him forever and rock the lives of several innocents.

Rajeev Khandelwala makes a fine debut. He may have stuck to repetitive expressions as the popular Sujal in Kahin To Hoga, the tele soap that made him a household name but in Aamir he delivers a polished performance that keeps you with him every inch of the way. Bravo!

Hats off to director Rajkumar Gupta. He keeps Aamir compelling exposing the worst of communal problems without ever getting preachy.

We need more movies like this one.

Another army funded science experiment gone wrong. Which leaves behind lead researcher Bruce(Edward Norton) who can transform into the scary hulk if you piss him off. So the poor guy hides in Brazil and learns to keep his heart beat at levels which will enable to stay human.

But the lure of a cure brings him back to the United States and the arms of his old beloved Liv Tyler whose daddy is an army man for whom the career comes first. And who sanctioned the project in the first place coz he wants to build true indestructible soldiers with Bruce’s blood.

So what you get is lotsa running around,transformations into Hulk and some more experimentation which results in a Hulk hybrid. So now you have the good Hulk against the bad Hulk.

Blah blah blah n blah. You can safely skip this one.

Batman is back!!!!! And how!!!

Bruce Wayne(Christian Bale) billionaire by day and Batman by night is busy trying to be happy without the love of his life, Rachel(Maggie Gyllenhaal). He’s charming, cocky and sincere all at the same time. He’s also using his business links to get wussy Japanese men who launder Mafia money to reveal their accounting books.

And as Batman he’s working hard with Lieutenant Gordon(Gary Oldman) planting marked money in Mafia owned banks to help arrest the bad guys. Who Gotham’s new golden boy, District Attorney, Harvey Dent(Aaron Eckhart) gets to prosecute, lock up and throw away the key. And be happily in love with Rachel.

But everyone’s plans go horribly wrong with the appearance of the psychotic clown,The Joker(Heath Ledger). Now the Joker redefines evil. A man without a conscience he is bent on bringing out the worst in Gotham city’s good people. And he’s incredibly clever. Always one step ahead of Gordon and Batman all he wants is for the caped crusader to take off his mask.Or maybe not.

The most evil enemy Gotham has encountered, The Joker tests Batman’s endurance. And costs him everything.

Director Christopher Nolan does a fabulous job with The Dark Knight. This one’s not for the faint hearted . Or for little kids.

Christian Bale does a great job as both Bruce Wayne and Batman. His turmoil and guilt over the death of the innocent is touching. Michael Cane as the faithful Alfred does a fine job. As does Morgan Freeman as the inventor Alex.

Aaron Eckhart is wonderful. You love his faith in goodness while he stays firmly in tune with reality.

Maggie Gyllenhaal disappoints. She’s a whiner this one.

But the movie well and truly belongs to Heath Ledger.He becomes The Joker sending shivers down your spine. You are disgusted by him but simply cant take your eyes off of him.

To borrow a line from Joker “I am like the dog chasing cars. If I actually caught one I wouldn’t know what to do with it!”. Ledger captures this mad essence of Joker rendering a superlative performance.

A must watch this one

Imagine living in a shoddy apartment next to a rail track. Waking up every morning to a nagging girlfriend …who by the way is sleeping with your best friend…to make your way to a job you detest and a boss who is out to get you. And survive panic attacks to top it all!!!

Well that’s poor Wesley Gibson(James McAovy) life till one fine day he runs into a trigger happy Fox(Angelina Jolie) who tells him the father who walked out on him when he was 7 days old died a coupla days back and oh ya! he was an assassin. And Wesley apparently can be one too as he is “gifted” like daddy dear. The panic attacks apparently were something more

So Wesley happily says good bye to his dreary life and joins The Fraternity, a group of assassins headed by Sloan(Morgan Freeman) where he proceeds to learn to curve a bullet and trains to accomplish his mission….killing Cross(Thomas Kretschmann), the man responsible for his father’s death.

But all is not as it seems in Wesley’s new world. He is soon seeking to escape the very people who promised him an exciting new life.

Based on the 2003 comic mini series Wanted is one big adrenaline rush. High on action and coolness it’s all the stuff you wanted to do while crawling your way through boredom.

We’ve heard similar stories and seen similar movies but what makes Wanted work is some quick editing and slick action.

Great if you are in the mood for a bang bang alpha male action flick.

And Angelina….god bless u!!!!

What if your side profile looked like Hrithik Roshan? And you had Priyanka Chopra as your alleged girlfriend? And you had a producer father making a sci-fi movie with never seen before effects for your debut? Life should be pretty good huh? But for poor Harman Baweja it goes all awry.

So the movie opens with Karan’s(Harman Baweja) entry(we have to see bits of him from his fingers to his glasses to finally see him in full view ) desperate to get his dad’s attention. You see Karan is stinking rich but has no one love him…his dad is too busy and his mom is dead.
So our poor little rich boy does loads of dare devil stuff as no one’s gonna miss him if he’s a goner.
Till he runs into a giggly Sana(Priyanka Chopra) who loves painting n poetry(at least what she calls poetry) and writes in her diary daily n actually says stuff like Dear Diary(such characters do not appear even in Mills n Boons these days) and soon he has someone to miss him

All is going good for the lovey dovey pair till Sana gets killed off in an accident just before she can give Karan a kiss with her cold cold lips after a strawberry ice cream.

Poor Karan is down in the dumps. But he does have a wacky scientist uncle, Uncle Ya who quit NASA to work on his time machine. After 15 years he does get it to work just in time for Karan to get to Mumbai 2050 where he’s sure he’ll find Sana again(the things men will do for a kiss ).

So Karan, Uncle Ya(Boman Irani) and Sana’s siblings land in futuristic Mumbai where they do discover Sana, only now she is Zaiyesha, a pop star who hates poetry and loves death defying games but still writes Dear Diary stuff!!!.
They also help fix a robot who insists on calling Karan sexy (someone should shoot that Balaki..the Cheeni Kum director) and agrees to help them get Karan woo Zaiyesha back.
Oh and he has to do this in 30 days or the time machine will return without him and he’ll age 50 years overnight

So Karan sets about getting Zaiyesha to flip for him and he also battles an evil dude(who looks like Darth Vader n his entire setup comes from Star Trek..did you get the props at a discount Mr Baweja????) and makes it back to 2008 in the nick of time with the love of his life(shouldn’t Zaiyesha now grow younger by 50 years?? N the robots not function???)

You wanna make a movie called Love Story you first write a good love story…not inane stuff that’ll make you wanna smother the lovers.
And if you want make a sci-fi movie with never seen before effects then come up with something that people didn’t see years ago in Back to the Future
And anything that borrows from Star Trek sucks….law of sci-fi.

Kareena Kapoor had brains walking out of this one(though she did do Tashan after tat ).
Priyanka Chopra disappoints in this one..can’t blame her much though, both Sana and Zaiyesha are dicey characters.

And Boman Irani!!!!! Wats up with you? How can you do an inane role like this one?????

And finally Harman Baweja. He doesn’t look too much like Hrithik or sound like him. And he definitely doesn’t have his talent. Maybe if he stopped trying so hard to be Hrithik(he even tries to deliver his lines in a similar fashion!!) he might find a place of his own(rem AB Baby? He did so much better once he stopped trying to be Pa)

Love Story 2050 manages to disappoint all on it’s own and wow it needed absolutely no help from Aamir Khan’s alleged “lets ruin Harman” campaign.

Stay away. Even if you are 5 and like pink teddy bears.