Paheli Solved

I am so happy to hear that Paheli did not win an Oscar Nomination.
  
    Amol Plaekar, the director of this movie is a world class actor who has entertained us with his down to earth roles in Movies like Golmal, Choti si Baat, Rang Birangi and countless others. His movies as director like Daayraa, Kairee & Dhyasparva were excellent. His 'Thodasa Roomani Ho Jaayen' was a unique film with its rhyming dialogues. This continued till he started casting People from the mainstream cinema like Sonali Bendre in 'Anaahat' and SRK and Rani in 'Paheli'. I often wonder why these great parallel cinema directors start spewing such crap after they become a little successful and have Bollywood stars ready to work with them.

    SRK on another note is a person I actively dislike. He may be the media's 'Badshah' Khan as well as the most popular star overseas, but the only instance in which I can remember him acting is in 'Swades'. He is a non-actor and none of his films, neither 'Asoka' [I had heard of Ashoka, but who is this Asoka?] nor 'Paheli' are world class movies.

    The way the story of Paheli was handled was absurd to begin with. The story of a Ghost falling in love with a beautiful Girl, had a lot of potential, but it was all squandered. The movie was so (unintentionally) funny that I went berserk laughing in the theatre. The people around me were looking at me in a funny sort of way, and the girl I had gone with, began to seriously question my sanity. Next day in college, when I announced that I had seen the movie, the first thing Dustin asked me was, “So how did the Ghost get Rani Pregnant?"

    If they had nominated Paheli, all hell would have broken loose on the pages of 'Bombay Times'. They probably would have declared SRK to be 'The Greatest Actor of the Third Millennium' or something.

    Not that I am saying that India does not produce good movies which the world (America in Particular) can enjoy. I watch only English and Hindi Movies, and yet I can name at least 3 good ones.

  1] Iqbal, a story of the struggle of a deaf & dumb Boy to achieve his dream of being a member of the Cricket team, would have been universally loved. We also know that the Americans have a weakness for sports heroes.

    2] Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi, a wonderful movie about Human relationships in troubled times, ‘A clash between idealism and realism', would have been a good choice. U should watch it just for Shiney Ahuja's great acting and Chitrangada Singh, who gave a wonderful performance to steal our hearts.
  
  3] Yahaan, a sensitively made movie about love under the dark shadow of terrorism, in Kashmir was also a good movie. The American's are suckers for terrorism related movies, and we let that go!

    These 3 movies are from the commercial part of cinema. And I don't even know about Marathi or Bhojpuri or Bengali or south Indian Movies. Just makes one wonder how many great movies are made in India.

    Its High time we stop our obsession with SRK and Yash Chopra type of movies and look at the great variety that we have to offer.