Movie - Dhoom 3 - My Review -

Aamir... Aamir... thats what is the movie all about. His Revenge, his childhood, his action sequence, his songs, his circus and last but not the least HIS BIKE. Dont keep your expectations high, neverthless you wont be disappointed by the movie for its sheer entertainment and nothing else. Here and there, few frames are available in the movie without Aamir in it, but in almost 90% of movie, you would see him and he is a pleasure to watch as well. Anyway, so lets get back to the review.

Movie starts off with a very nice background story of aamir's childhood, the child portrayed as Aamir has also done a nice job. Its about his dad (played by jackie Shroff) being an owner of a circus in Chicago which is in loss and the bank of Chicago is behind him to recover the loan or close down the circus. As the hindi movies in the past have shown, the dad does not want to close down the circus and cannot repay the loan as well. Hence his short role comes to an end and rest of the movie is about Aamir to take revenge on the bank.

Now supposedly Aamir is negative in the movie, and then the supposedly positive cast of Abhishek and uday need to team up again and stop Aamir from taking his revenge. So the intro of Aamir starts with a chasing sequence, himself on bike and rest of the Chicago police in their cars. I admit, these chases have been done over and over again and you can possibly guess each and every frame of what happens in this chase except for one silly move where aamir makes his escape as expected.

Then the theme of movie, blah blah blah... Nothing much happens and movie runs normally until 5 mins before interval. An amazing twist in the movie which makes the first half of the movie amazingly watchable and keeps you insterested in the second half. And then second half starts with a romantic angle (well you need to realize there is Katrina too in the movie), and hence one song and then normal drag of hindi movies. yet again there is another interesting twist towards the last half hour of movie and then the climax is as usual on the expected lines.

Overall not a brilliant movie or a fantastic movie, but pretty much a one time watch movie. This could've been a better movie if only they focussed more on how Aamir robs the bank instead of the chase sequences. This is in similar lines of Dhoom-1 where none of the robbery is shown as to how it happens and we always see the cops chasing the robbers on bike. In that aspect, Dhoom-2 was little bit better since the robbery is shown on screen which keeps viewers interested.

Finally this is just a movie which does not show the best performance by Aamir but the Aamir's performance is definitely the best in the movie. A movie to watch only for Aamir and nothing else. Around 2 stars out of 5 but an extra .5 for Aamir ;)

CLASH OF THE TITANS - 2 -

Missed the first part - Click Here

So for the first attack - I show him my index finger and on a little higher note, I tell him to go to kitchen and help his mom. He looks at me and blankly says "Naa...", I tell him the same again by raising my voice a little more, and he outright rejects it with another "Naa... No...". So I take out my triumph card and tell him - "Oh boy, mumma is going to give you chocolates if you go to kitchen...". Aaahh there it is, his eyes are now gleaming when he listens to the magic word - Chocolate. My triumph card has worked. He is now on his way to kitchen at a double speed. I relax and get back to watch my match in peace... Only for next 40 secs.

40 Secs pass-by, my kiddo is back to my place. Taps me on my hand and says "choc... jayeeee... " (meaning he wants choc). I just cant understand why is he asking me when I had such wonderfully sent him to his mom asking for the same. At same time my wife comes to the hall, gives a wicked smile. Instantly I get the signal and understand that my wife would've told my kiddo that the choc is not with her but to ask daddy to get one. Hence he has come back to me asking for choc. My triumph card has been crushed by the combined force of my kid and my wife. Back to square one. I decide to take on the aggressive mode. I point my hand at him, in a flash I realize I have held the tv remote in my hand and at the very moment my kiddo grabs my remote and starts clicking some buttons. It changes my channel and I get up from my seat to grab my remote back... "No... no... na...naa..." he screams and runs towards kitchen with the remote. I have no choice but to run behind him. 

Obviously he cant outrun me and hence I catch him soon, he tightens the grip on the tv remote. Again obviously his strength is no match to mine, hence I easily over-power him and get the remote from his hand. He starts screaming and runs behind his mom. I return back to my tv and switch back to my match. Since my kiddo is now crying in the kitchen, I believe I will be able to completely watch my match now. 

Hardly another 30 secs pass-by and my wife carrying my kiddo comes to hall. "Now... there... dont cry baby, pappa will put on the rhymes for you". Instantly my kiddo stops crying and shouts - "Ee... ya... O...", "Ee... Ya... O...". I am stumped out now. I cant change my channel now, but not only my wife has made my kid remember his initial demand but has also silenced him out from crying by showing him a hanging carrot (i.e. rhymes on TV). Now my kiddo is expectantly watching me and slowly murmuring - "Ee... Ya... O..." repeatedly. It seems like he will again start crying if I don't put on his rhymes. Unexpectedly, my wife has hit 2 birds with one stone here. I cant watch the match in peace when my kiddo is making such a sad face nor I can put on rhymes and surrender to my kiddo. One final punch was missing until this moment and my wife just lands the final blow - "please put on the rhymes naa... Look he is so much keen to watch his rhymes...".

Thats it. I cant take it anymore. I accept my defeat and surrender to the combined mighty force of my wife and kiddo. I finally change my channel and put on the rhymes. My kiddo has now started saying loudly "Ee... Ya... O..."... and feels pretty excited too. He gets down on the floor, moves closer to TV and starts watching his rhymes being played on TV. After sometime, he comes to me - "Appppaaaa.... Apppa... " calls me and points his hand towards Tv and says "Ee... Ya... O..." and gives a big giggling smile. I too return my smile and realize that the match was just not worth a watch in exchange for the smile on my kiddo's face. I keep the tv remote on the tv top, hold my kiddo and take him on my lap and start enjoying rhymes with him.

As they say History repeats again, on the next day... the clash of the titans repeats again... another fierce battle awaits... !!

[THE END]

CLASH OF THE TITANS - 1 -

It is always a case when you have freedom to choose your TV channels at home. In my home I have this exclusive rights on keeping the tv remote with me when there is a cricket match going on or my favorite movie going on and I can choose to watch it over the melodramatic serials my wife and mom prefer. Most often I generously give away the TV remote to my mom or wife so they can watch their channel when I am done with my cricket or when my team is winning easily or when my team is losing badly and hence I settle down to watch those dramatic never ending daily soaps and doze off.

This has been the understanding at my home from past few years and I have been enjoying it until recently. The things are changing from past few weeks and the reason is none other than my 2 year kiddo. Usually he does not like to watch TV and often he gets irritated if anyone else is watching the TV unless his rhymes dvd is playing on the TV. He usually refers to his rhymes dvd as "E..ya..O..". So here I was, starting to switch on the TV and watch my cricket highlights as I had missed out on the LIVE match.

Kiddo comes, sees what I am trying to watch on TV, stares at me. I give him a smile back. He does not smile back, but continues to stare at me and points to TV and tells "E..ya..O..". I understand instantly that he wants me to put on his rhymes DVD now. I cant do that, I need to badly watch this match. I have to distract him now else he has made his motives clear (to Attack me and capture TV). I open a civilized conversation with him explaining him that there is this interesting cricket match going on and we both can watch the same. He nods his head and I assume he agrees with me on this and now to my surprise he is going near the TV and watching the cricket. I thank god, give a satisfied smile and start watching the match. (Defended myself smoothly. nice move.)

15 secs pass-by, kiddo starts staring at me again, he is not convinced with my cricket theory and he is not finding the cricket match interesting. I tend to ignore him and continue to watch my match expecting another brutal attack. I need to keep my defensive tactics ready to tackle his attacks. Anytime now... and there it is, he notices that I am ignoring him, he comes near me... call me "Appppa... Appppaaaa... E.. ya...O..". As expected, another attack. I watch him, start explaining him again how important it is for me to watch this match now and I promise him that I will play his rhymes once this match gets over (45 mins more left). He is convinced again... (my defense tactics working)... I carry him on my lap and he starts watching the match with me...

25 secs pass-by, kiddo starts staring at me again. I realize he is not in mood to watch cricket as he is definitely not finding it interesting. At this point of time the only thing which is interesting as per him is his rhymes. I somehow need to distract him and defend myself for the next 45 mins, and distract him in such a way that I should be able to watch my match in peace as well... which also means its time for me to go on an ATTACK now...

(To be continued… Click Here)

Life of my sweetie pie - Second year -

Its been nearly one year after the grand celebration of his first year Birthday. This year has been very unusual and the most unexpected of things have happened which we never dreamt of. We hoped for a decent normal year as the last one, but how can it be the same. This kid has gained one year of experience, known all the people around from our family, neighbours and friends. He can now identify our family members from the strangers, he can identify his apppa(for some strange reason, he does not call bappa), aayee and ajji, he can identify his closest and most often visited Amma(with a stick), abbu, amma, kaaka and kaaki, he can identify all his other kaaka's, aatya's, maama's, maushi's, abu's, amma's. He has developed this extra-ordinary ability to identify the special food joints - McD, KFC and Dominos, afterall to give his dad a big company. 

One month after his first birthday - he could stand up on his own feet and start to walk slowly. The most amazing and happiest day arrived when he started to put his first step without holding to sofa or a chair. The happiness slowly started fading away from us and started appearing on his face more often. It was very clear that he was enjoying his days of walk and run, but clearly he had gained a lot of energy. We tried to control him for few weeks and days by running behind him, but soon ran out of our energy and patience as well. Since he was very new on this field, we often saw the days where he would stumble on the floor, fall from the stairs, hit out on chair and on each of the occassion escaping with minor scratches. His energy was doubled and ours halved. Yet these are still enjoyable and memorable days of our lives.

This year has also seen him develop few emotions like react to the pranks, identify the teasers, feel humilated when scolded, laugh, cry and ofcourse his main weapon being emotional black-mail. His naughtiness has been doubled from last year and we were forced to put him into a kindergarten school. His school is scheduled for one hour everyday, and that one precious hour is enough to complete all the household activties which seemed impossible if he were at home. His activities at home have been so intense that we are forced to keep an eye on him every second, else something or the other is going to happen. The last 3-4 months have been so much high in his activities, that if the normal human has a BP of 120, we have easily crossed 300 atleast thrice a week either in scolding him or controlling our irritation inside us. 

This year also saw him develop some peculiar kind of liking to kitchen. He more often than not plays with the utensils than his toys. Altough he does not have much taste for music, he likes to create noise using the kitchen utensils. He is in front of TV to watch only when some item songs from hindi movies are being played. He likes these munnis and Sheelas and his most favorite being jintata chita chita, on other occassions when the TV is on, he behaves as if its not playing anything not only for him but for others as well. He does not like anyone to watch TV when he is not watching it himself. Its been that kind of a year when your kid is saving electricity bills when you are forced to turn off the TV and also saves your movie budget, because we have not attempted to watch even a single movie in theatre from past 2.5 years after his visible hatred for small screen. 

The year 1 to 2, the most difficult year if your kid turns out to be double naughty. It is said that the kids are unstable from year 1 to 3 when they really are not aware of do's and dont's, rights and wrongs, they fall, they learn, they start judging the rights, wrongs in their own way, their memory starts to increase, they observe lot of new things, try to talk words, we fail to understand but our guess is the best option. If we fail to understand what the kiddo is trying to tell, we try to divert his attention on to other things successfully only because his mind can be moulded at this stage. Finally no matter how difficult this year was, it has been by far the best year of our lives. This year has been the most entertaining and the most enjoyable in our lives.