HAWAA HAWAAI: Honest, sincere and simply Heartrending!! [3.5/5]

Sincerity shows. Honesty pays off. And simplicity stays…in your heart, forever. If not so, how could Amole Gupte’s just another ‘underdog takes it all’ drama HAWAA HAWAAI not only manage to entertain, excite and impress you but also stirs you up with the ruthless reality we are in without being any sympathetic or sensitive about it. Though slightly superficial in novelty, HAWAA HAWAAI could definitely be seen as a charmingly emotional story of a distant relative to Stanley from Gupte’s first directorial drama STANLEY KA DABBA. Moving and deeply thought-provoking!

HAWAA HAWAAI is all about hope. Hope that blooms and flourishes in the very odd of life where everyone else would decide to step back! After his farmer father’s unfortunate death, when Arjun Harishchandra Waghmare [Partho Gupte in a stellar-performance] - a kid with starry eyes is forced to shift to the swarming city of dreams Mumbai, he doesn’t hesitate an ounce from taking a job at local tea-vendor to offload some burden from his single mother. And there, life blesses him with a hope- a dream to fly not with some pair of wings but wheels.

HAWAA HAWAAI is about making choices you believe in. Skating is never a profitable venture one should look up to for all his life. Lucky Bhargava [Saqib Saleem] has always been told that by his ‘the great American keeda’ brother and a skating-professional now settled as an investment banker in US, but still the choice Lucky makes to train a ‘chaiwallah’ is nothing short of chasing his own dreams cherishing now in Arjun’s eyes.

HAWAA HAWAAI is also about having friends for life. Who would have thought a gajra-seller, a rag-picker and workers at Car service center & small-time hand-embroidery factory could ingest so much to make his friend achieve what he only can dream of! In one sequence; when asked about their individual dreams, one of them fervently replies, “ek time par ek hich sapna, pehle woh poora kar lete hain!”

And above all, HAWAA HAWAAI is all about kids. Kids who live, act and behave in a better manner than most of the adults would do! So when a typical burger-eating rich kid offers his expensive skating kit to Arjun as he would feel proud to see him win the competition, you sure feel imparted with the emotion. Partho Gupte is the most uninhibited performer no less than any established actors in the list. The kind of sincerity and effortlessness he infuses is mesmerizing and a textbook material for anyone interested in the business. Saqib impresses with his ease and confidence. The gang of four kids sweeps away most of the lighter moments in the film but the one who deserves all the applause is Amole Gupte. His approach of handling kids with care onscreen is amazing.

Overall; HAWAA HAWAAI is a much better film for your kids than those heavy action sci-fi superhero films despite lacking the urge of being original sometime. It may not be as fresh, new and inventive in concept as STANLEY KA DABBA but in emotions, it’s strong enough to shadow all odds like Arjun does in the movie. Watch it! [3.5/5]

JACKPOT: Poker faced entertainment! Promises everything, offers nothing! [.5/5]

Earlier in the film; when being questioned by a sluggish, lethargically slow-spoken cop played by the theatrical Makrand Deshpande, Naseeruddin Shah is seen with the name of Ram Gopal Varma on the board in the backdrop, I sink in my deep confusion if that was done in good gesture to show a great respect to the filmmaker or it was just a pun intended because this baffling camel sits neither of the sides.

The comedy con thriller ‘JACKPOT’ marks a long-awaited comeback of Kaizad Gustad- a filmmaker who, despite giving ‘Dud of the Decade’ BOOM, had shown great promises as a new-wave filmmaker [of then, at least] with his violently witty BOMBAY BOYS well before the ‘Anurag Kashyap Phenomenon’ came in to the scene. Sadly, JACKPOT disappoints at all fronts. It misses the magical touch of Gustad that used to bring the underworld in light in the most ‘unexplored before’ maniac manner. It also fails to impress with an amateurish approach in film-making.

Set in the mysteriously drugged nature of Goa, 4 con artists [Sachin Joshi & Sunny Leone plays two of them] induce a 250 Cr land-deal to the owner of the biggest casino in the city [played by Naseeruddin Shah in his weirdly ‘rope like hair strings’ getup] but in order to get things in process, they also must win the yearly poker game of 5 Cr Jackpot organized on Shah’s cruiser. They get succeeded but not the way it was planned. Now, the jackpot money is missing and everyone involved believes others are done with it. Does it not sound familiar with most of the con films? Well, even that can be overlooked if the screenplay takes the lead and provides breathtaking twists and turns to let loose your thinking horses all the time.

In the countable-on-fingers merits if I think hard, there is an impressive opening credits inspired by 007 Bond movie title sequences. Though it creates only some false conjecture to what it may come to you in next 90 minutes, it is a well-thought, nicely done part. I also can not agree more on that the duration was defiantly a big & decisive pro for me. Cinematography is strictly ok. Some one-liners are witty and remind you of the Kaizad Gustad of late 90’s but I don’t see reasons for what songs were doing in the midst of this entire supposedly crisp thriller.

For the performances, I would say you are looking for wrong thing at the wrong place. Sachin Joshi is probably the worst looking hero in recent times. He impressed most with his action sequences in AZAAN but here he depresses everyone with his unkempt, messy look and equally bad dialogue delivery [He doesn’t even bother to lip-sync the song he’s performing in]. And to top it all, he is the one who narrates the story for the most part. God bless the viewers! Sunny Leone doesn’t disappoint much as she does what she does best…and I am not talking about acting. Naseeruddin Shah repeats himself. We have seen him before in such avatar. Why he needs to opt for such scripts is unconvincing.

Overall; if this is the comeback, I would like to see Gustad resting in peace wherever he was till now. This JACKPOT makes you feel loser at the end and is something that no one wants to win. Boredom is what you get out of this poker faced entertainment! [.5/5] 

ISSAQ: Leave this unintentionally funny love-story of epic fail alone! [1.5/5]

When, in the very first half, people of all ages sitting around you in a multiplex auditorium start giggling, chattering, commenting, questioning and mocking on the relativity of the film & the sensibility of the filmmaker, one must learn that there is something that has gone wrong while trying to create something impressive.

Manish Tiwary’s ISSAQ- a modern day adaptation of Shakespearean love-story Romeo & Juliet, is one such shameful effort that scrawls and struggles to be ambitiously epic romantic thriller set in Banaras. But thanks to the brigade of most horrible performers in the cast, tacky screenplay and the immature-uncontrolled-abandoned direction that submerges all the potentials and promises to make it an unintentionally funny outing for cinema-lovers.

First of all, the Banaras shown here is not the likeable-lovable-pleasingly colourful Banaras of ‘Raanjhanaa’ but more of a bloody violent-fiercely infuriated & uncivilized rustic one that breathes into an air filled with the smell of gunpowder & explosives of all kind. Rahul & Bachchi [played by Prateik & Amyra] falls in love despite all the warnings to stay away from each other as they belong to families of blood-thirsty rivals. And, they only look at it as just another reason to keep the war alive to establish one’s supremacy.

Unexpectedly ISSAQ has some of the best talents in its ensemble supporting cast like Prashant Narayanan as menacing naxal leader, Neena Gupta as the old confidante & caretaker, Rajeshwari Sachdev as manipulative young wife to Sudhir Pandey- another respected name and Makrand Deshpande as witty babaji with chillum…but for one or another reasons, they all look wasted and quite out of the place in their acting skills probably because of the bumpy- patchy messy plot-subplot labyrinth. Pratiek needs serious lessons in acting including voice modulations. Amyra impresses especially in a scene where she had to recite excerpts from Jayshankar Prasad’s Kamayani in the classroom. Ravi Kishan knows his limits and decides better not to break them. Vineet Singh sure had a longer canvas to milk his potential but not the better one.

In a scene when Makrand sees his devotees getting bored and feeling drowsy over his divine gyaan, he immediately switches to perform a miraculous gimmick to keep them attentive. Unfortunately, Manish Tiwari didn’t have even such gimmicks to make viewers indulged and devoted to the film.  Language being too colloquial-too slangish, editing being weirdly abrupt at places and the uncleaned visual effects are just a few put-offs to name. Only positives are the cinematography and detailing in the art & setting department. You can look out for the real Banaras but only in corners of the frame and in the backdrop, mostly out of focus!

All in all, this mocking love-story that doesn't even spare itself to laugh at, is nothing but a complete waste of nearly 2 & half hours and your hard earned money! Leave it alone…and better look out for other options of entertainment, this weekend! [1.5/5]