Life of Pi

Wanted to desperately see this movie after having read the novel. Finally got the chance in Cathay Pacific airlines from LA to Hong Kong. As it is rightfully said, this is an unfilmable novel and the fact that this was made into a movie in itself is remarkable. Good thing about the movie is that nothing from the novel is taken out. If any, scenes have been added (I think, because I don’t remember Pi’s girlfriend-story in the novel). Apart from that, movie is exceptionally well taken. If we thought Titanic is the be-all and end-all of sinking ship movies, this was even better. One can feel the storm in the movie, the way ship rocked to and fro, and sunk. One can feel the fear when Pi sees Richard Parker in the life boat. I didn’t feel it when I read the novel but I certainly did when I saw the movie, even though I knew it was there! That’s the magic of movie! Thoroughly enjoyed it.

Ramona and Beezus

A movie hosted in the Tustin Library for children 12 and under with parents. This was kind of the first "theater" experience for Paavani although she still doesnt understand movies and its stories. But the movie itself was very nice, entertaining and filled with feel-good factor although the emotions in the story-line was going down and down three quarters of the movie. A very nice movie from the eyes of a 9 year old.
Rating: Good

Barfi!

Wow. What a movie! I could only say this when I saw the movie twice. I had to rewind and forward and rewind and forward the movie several times (on the same day) to truly soak in each scene of the movie, and appreciate the beauty of the direction and story. This is in the class of The English Patient, Life is Beautiful, Sadma and such movies that doesn’t deserve a single viewing. This one has mystery, romance, adventure and tragedy all packed into one solid punch. One really needs to see it on a system where dialogs and scenes can be heard back and forth at the viewer’s pleasure – not just once, like on the Big Screen. Many scenes seen during the first viewing makes complete sense when the movie is seen twice or even thrice. It is a movie (similar to the aforementioned movies) that completely gut-wrenched me and the hangover lasted for most of the next day. Very few movies touch me so much. And this is one of them. Truly top class!

Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara

A road trip by three friends in Spain. Three major sports chosen by each person. Each sport opens up a pent-up feeling in one of the friends each time. Nothing great about the movie, but not boring or avoidable. Worth a watch.
Rating: Good

Ladies Vs Ricky Behl

A con movie. Not boring. Refreshing set of characters. Middle-class life portrayed well.
Rating: Good

Housefull

A below average movie. Full of cheap jokes that doesn't have much humour. Pretty thin direction. Avoidable.
Rating: Average

Aan Milo Sajna

Another typical old Hindi movie. Nice, clean dialog, simple but complicated romance, one villain and happy-ending climax.
Rating: Average

Chup Chup Ke

Rajpal Yadav and Paresh Rawal. It is for them the movie has to be seen. And Priyadarshan's direction, of course. It is humorous, has good dialogs and interesting story twists.

Rating: Good

High School Musical - 2

Musical teenage movie. Time pass.
Rating: Average

Upkaar

Typical old movie about good son - bad son, and the bad son realizing his mistakes in the end. But this movie has a lot of patriotism thrown in. Also emphasizes the farmers duty to the land. Made me remember The Good Earth.
Rating: Average

Do Raasthe

Family movie. Poverty, issues with joint family, rich girls, etc. Not an entertainer, just another time pass old Hindi movie.
Rating: Average  

Jab Jab Phool Kile

Time pass. Standard love story of a low class man with a high class woman set against Kashmir's beautiful backdrop.
Rating: Average

Aap Ki Kasam

Nothing great but nice in it's simplicity, as in all 1970 movies. First half is all happy-happy but latter half is all sad-sad. Some adulterous dialog in the middle surprised me though.

Rating: Average

Dhoom: 2

Suffice to say there are better movies in the same genre.
Rating: Average

Band, Baaja, Baarath

Very thin. Not much in it. Avoidable.
Rating: Average

Robot

The much hyped-Rajni's movie. Saw the Hindi version.
Heavily Avoidable. Thin dialogs and poor acting. 

Aarakshan

A must-see movie on reservation in education system. Powerful dialogs.

Amar Prem

Avoidable.

Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi

Plot of movie will be clear in first half hour. Its filled with so-called humorous and SRK's over-acting scenes to make it 3 hrs. But a profound movie with good dialogues.
Rating: Good

Kati Patang

Simpleness is written all over the old movies. Makes it watchable. Nothing great though.
Rating: Average

Dil Deewana

Jaya Bhaduri's acting is worth the watch. It is nice to see 'real' middle class families in these 80s movies.
Rating: Average

Namak Halal

The celebrated Amitabh's movie. Typical 80's movie. Nothing great about it.
Rating: Average

Mere Brother Ki Dulhan

Different story-line. The title says it all and pretty much gives away the story in the first 15 minutes. But still its nice to see the entanglements getting un-tangled.
Rating: Good

Kissise Na Kehna

Hilarious. A simple middle class romantic story with an overbearing father in law - lies and the twists associated with it, and of course, the happy ending. A perfect recipe for a movie.
Rating: Good.

Aandhi

Clean, simple, catchy. Its amazing what charm old Hindi movies had. Very easily can relate to the middle class families.
Rating: Average

Veer Zaara

Some over exaggerated emotions and passions. But catchy dialogues. Good story line with enough twists to not making boring.

Sex and the City - 2

Saw the movie on TV in bits and pieces. Especially the Abhu Dhabi part. Pretty average stuff.

How to lose a guy in 10 days

Time pass. Light comedy at times. Romantic at other times.

The Transporter

Starts off as a thriller but finally ends up like a Bollywood blockbuster where nothing happens to the hero in spite of 1000 bullets. However nice action, nice stunts, nice fights. Worth a watch.
Rating: Good.

Valentine's Day

A really nice movie. Once again - like Crash, Vantage Point, 11:14, Babel, He's Just Not That Into You - multiple stories intertwine one amongst other to create a nice romantic collage of a 'picture' :)

Drillbit Taylor

Time pass kiddo movie.

Vantage Point

As IMDB states, an attempted assassination is told and re-told in different perspectives, each adding to the story and making it that much more complicated and an edge-of-the-seat thriller. Very good movie.

The Day After Tomorrow

After Inconvenient Truth this is the next movie on global warming that I have seen. Very well depicted. Has lots of thriller-moments (not needed actually) which makes the movie an edge-of-the-seat. A sci-fi but very close to reality.

Its complicated

Its a complicated story of old age romance and affairs :-)

Paul Blart: Mall Cop

Sort of a rom com. Most scenes shot inside a mall with the hero being a Mall cop and heroine being a saleswoman inside the mall. Things turn for the worse (or better?) when mall is hijacked.
Rating: Average

Ganesha Matthe Bandha

Catchy dialogs. Humorous scenes. Nice story line and twists. Family entertainer. Well portrayed and easy-flowing.
Rating: Good

The Social Network

Captivating story of Mark Zuckerberg (co-Founder of Facebook.com) and the rise of Facebook.com. A must-see.

Pineapple Express

Crazy movie! Its thrilling when two innocent men are caught in between two gang wars. But its fun when they themselves are not so innocent and one cop belongs to one of the gangs!! From the director of Knocked up.

Mad Money

Wow! What a movie! Nice story, nice acting, nice score, nice casting, nice direction and nice ending! All in all, a must see!

American Graffiti

Pretty boring. Saw only first 40 minutes and story was not going anywhere. Just a bunch of graduates celebrating end of school.

Anger Management

Time pass. Back to back Jack Nicholson movies. Kind of funny movie. Watchable once.

The Bucket List

What a movie! A must-see written all over it! Its good to have a bucket-list - things to do before one kicks the bucket. Flip part? One's gotta have lot of money!

Spy Game

Gripping. A movie that depicts a CIA operation that never was! What starts off with a simple jail break in China, traverses across Vietnam and Beirut while all the talking goes on in Langley, Virginia. Very well made movie.

Mamma Mia!

Totally musical! Comparable to Hum Aapke Hain Kaun. Thin story line but set in picturesque locality. There is a song sung every 5 minutes - sometimes its funny but sometimes it gets at you. Watchable once.
Rating: Average

Kingdom of Heaven

"From the director of Gladiator" said the tagline on the DVD and that was enough for me to choose this movie. Like Gladiator, this movie too is extremely well made. The epic story, the war, the romance, the dialogs - definitely a must-see.

Twenty Bucks

An interesting story about how one $20 bill goes from one person to another person and sometimes coming back to people with whom it had already traversed at one point of time. Nice way of narration and a unique story theme. Watchable once. It is fun to try to recollect the complete story of how the $20 bill moved from one person to another after watching the movie. It is almost like playing the game of 'Memory'.

Jackie Chan's First Strike

A surprisingly nice story line in a Jackie Chan movie. It was in fact pretty thick - almost Bond-like movie what with Nuclear Warheads and CIA and FSB (previously KGB). Of course, superb fight scenes, esp the funny ones underwater.
Rating: Good

Gangster: A Love Story

A nice movie. Good direction. The lead female role is very critical and could have been acted well. It starts one evening and ends the next day morning. But it is filled with flashback and events that led to that fateful evening. One feels that the movie is going only one way: down. There is no happy ending and there cannot be in movies like this, as in Satya and Company. In movies of such dark nature, one thing I have noticed is that everyone dies - the hero, the villain, the heroine, the supporting actor, etc. But the ending depicted in this movie is very nice. It transcends that Love is strong enough even above Death. Somewhat similar to Gladiator.

Inglourious Basterds

Quentin Tarantino never disappoints. In his own different way of film-making, this movie tells about a story that never happened in real life but how easily it could have. Set in the 1940s when Nazis ruled the world, the film has all that is needed for a Nazi Vs Jews drama. Superb dialogs. Christoph Waltz's role in the movie and acting is amazing. Little wonder he got Best Actor award for this film in Cannes film festival.

The Devil Wears Prada

A nice movie. Set amidst the fashion industry, it also depicts the role of a highly challenging secretarial post for a devilish boss and how such a work life affects the personal life. The movie is different and is good. In it's own way, it slightly resembles Mean Girls.

Anjaana Anjaani

Not bad. Pinches of (not slick) humor here and there. Only thing that is overdone is the part about suicide, but then the crux of the movie is about suicide. Doesn’t bore. Movie totally taken in USA.
Rating: Average

What Happens in Vegas.

A nice RomCom. A random trip to Vegas changes the life of a married lady and an unemployed person for ever. Just goes to show that What happens in Vegas, does not stay in Vegas! It also made me think that any man and any woman can fall in love with one another if they stay together for a significant amount of time.
Rating: Good

Armour of God

I had seen this movie about 2 decades ago in a small tent and I had not understood much of the story but understood it better now. Not that there is much of a story. Its pretty silly but then the movie is famous for Jackie Chan’s stunts and fights. This, it has much in quantity and quality. Best part for me is at the end of the movie when the mis-shots are shown.
Rating: Average

Badmaash Company

Pretty interesting. Introduces unique ways of creating bad money but lot of loop holes. Good characterization. Watchable once.

All the Best

Very mediocre. Attempted humour doesn't really click. Time pass.

The Last Shot

Average. Movie moves fine and story is ok-dokey, it doesnt get you bored, etc. But there is no punch in the movie. Very mediocre.

Terms of Endearment

A story about a tight-lipped mother and an easy-going daughter and their respective love lives. Not a RomCom but very typical story of an American middle class. Nicely portrayed.
Rating: Average

Babel

Story theme similar to 11:14 and Crash where different characters in the movie are related to a single event. Such movies are always my favorite where the stories of different characters revolve around one single time-event.
Rating: Good

Mayor Muthanna

Nice hard hitting dialogs and song lyrics. Was a long time since I had seen a black and white Kannada Rajkumar movie. Plain and simple; nice and poignant. Typical '70s story-line. Dwarakeesh and Balamurali's comedy - as good as ever!
Rating: Good

The Break-up

Totally about break-up and how a relationship floats farther and farther away. Good verbal fight scenes and good picturization of a couple's compromises but an average movie. Not a RomCom as marketed.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

This movie has 8.2 on the IMDB but I felt it was over-rated. It might have such a high rating perhaps because it is a true story. Movie is mainly on the chase when the hunter becomes the hunted. Nothing great about it though.
Rating: Average

Boys

Tamil flick. Rahman music. Shankar direction. Genelia and Siddharth (the Bommarillu pair). Freshness but kinda dragged. Equal importance given to parents and youth but some unnecessary scenes. Good digital work with songs.
Rating: Average

Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging

Brit. Very mediocre. A typical adolescent movie of gals having crush over guys and vice versa. Not worth it.

Honeymoon in Vegas

Story on similar lines as Indecent Proposal but this one's much funnier and lighter. Set in Vegas and Hawaii, the title is a misnomer. Its about what actually happens in Vegas prior to the wedding - and there is no real honeymoon depicted in the movie.

Knocked up

Damn funny. A one night stand leads to a hilarious comedy of coming-together of two totally opposite individuals. A perfect Friday-night movie for couples!

One Fine Day

A RomCom. A very nice movie about two desperate divorcees-wanting-to-find-partners-but-dont-want-to-show-desperation!
Rating: Good

Black

Emotionally touching. Strong theme. Good acting by both Rani and Amitabh.
Rating: Good

He's Just Not That Into You

A Romantic Comedy (RomCom). A story of 9 lives which get entangled and dis-entangled for the same reason: Romance! Beautiful direction, acting and dialog.
Rating: Good.

Aamir

Tight, gripping story line. Reminded me of a line I had read in a magazine almost a decade ago: "When the underworld approaches you, you cannot refuse."
Rating: Average.

A Mighty Heart

I had seen Daniel Pearl's assassination in a forwarded video in 2003 and it had shocked me. This movie gives insights into what Mrs Pearl went through during those traumatic days.
Rating: Must-see.

Luck By Chance

A good story about Bollywood-wannabes and how stardom affects their personal lives. But not much of a punch in the movie.
Rating: Average

The World is not enough

Pretty surprising that I hadn't watched this movie till date. Good action, as usual in any Bond movie but too complicated a story to follow. And of course, too much technology to understand.
Rating: Average.

Paathshaala

Average movie but strong theme. Its about how the education system has been commercialized. Punch is definitely missing in the story and direction. Shahid's role in the movie is unnecessarily hyped. Ending is pathetic and fails to deliver.

Duplicity

My God! This was a corker of a movie! Perhaps its because its been quite some time since I saw a movie like this. Espionage and counter-espionage and counter-counter-espionage! Strangely, this was not recommended by anyone and I just took a chance (this movie was taken of the shelf just by reading the back cover of the DVD)! The movie is always running speedily and one has to hang onto every word! Literally, an edge-of-the-seat thriller and a definite must-see.

Page 3

Wow! What a puncher of a movie! It doesnt start out that way though. It starts more like a camcorder recording Bollywood parties but slowly it shapes out into a story thats hard-hitting and shows Life in it's truest sense...

Changeling

Wow! What a movie! I had mentioned before that I somehow dont get to like Clint Eastwood's movies but this one blew me away! Perhaps it is because this is a true story. Excellent acting by Angelina Jolie.

Sugar and Spice

Movie about cheerleaders is always fun to watch and it is not just for the mind-blowing dance! This is an average, time-pass movie about how one cheerleaders gets herself pregnant and find herself running out of money. The result? A Bank robbery!

Freaky Friday

Comedy. Mother, daughter and son are all losing their relationships when one freaky Friday, the mother's soul enters into daughter and vice versa. Lo and behold the fun times and how it actually bonds the relationships. Good direction. Typical Lindsay Lohan movie.

The Reader

Another movie set in Berlin. Another movie related to Nazi. Another good movie. The movie is about one woman's illiteracy and her ego of not making it public, intertwined with romance with a boy half her age.

Exceptional acting by Kate Winslet. I kind of like all Ralph Fiennes movies (Constant Gardener, Schindler's List, The English Patient, etc).

Valkyrie

Gripping from start. Set in Germany in 1944, this is about an operation to assassinate Adolf Hitler. Good movie.

Saagari

After a long time, saw a horror film. An average movie about a soul which possesses a living being in order to take revenge of it's own untimely death. But direction is gripping, and the movie does indeed scare a bit. Worth watching. Interspersed with good humour.

Atithi Tum Kab Jaoge

Average. Mediocre story line. Dry humour. To an extent, instilled with morality. Time pass.

Revolutionary Road

The Titanic couple - DiCaprio and Winslet pair up again as an American estranged couple in this movie set in 1950s. Its kinda average movie but exceptional acting by both the lead parts. Most characters are psychos in the movie and there definitely is no feel-good factor about this movie. You'd rather have it end it sooner than when it actually does.

17 again

An average movie. Very much a stereotype of similar movies like Big, etc. Time pass.

The Informant

Pretty good movie about a whistle-blower in an agricultural industry who gets into deep waters of corporate politics and, lo and behold, FBI! Strangely, a true story.

The Ugly Truth

Wow! Very nice movie but definitely not for kids! Curiously and simply funny and very entertaining to watch two skilled opposite gender people go at one another on one topic. Full of catchy dialogue.

Wake up Sid

Average. Slow. Refreshing. But Konkana Sen is a treat to watch. Simple romantic movie.

Malibu Spring Break

Pathetic. Just goes to show that the wordings on the back side of a DVD should never be the reason to watch a movie. Absolutely no stuff in the movie.

The Hangover

"What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas" is best portrayed in this hilarious movie about 3 guys who go to Vegas along with the groom for Bachelor's Party. Rated R for adultish content.

Rating: Good

Gran Torino

I guess its just me but I kinda dont get to like Clint Eastwood's movies. I didnt like Million dollar baby nor this. Its made well, nice story and all that but didnt feel any 'wow' factor.
Rating: Average

Choti Si Baath

A simple jovial Hindi story of wooing a girl while being diffident.
Rating: Good

The Incredibles

A nice animated movie about super heroes and their lives.
Rating: Good

Morning Walk

A very homely (Hindi) movie about Indian middle class but it revolves more around the dad of the house (Anupam Kher). It seemed engaging in the beginning but lost out in the latter part.
Rating: Average

My Name is Khan

Surprised my wife with a Valentine gift of ticket to this movie!
A good story of how innocent Muslims were treated post 9/11 in US but kinda sloppy direction at times. Some scenes could have been edited to be made more gripping. Shahrukh's role resembles Dustin's role in Rainman.
Rating: Average

Ratatouille

Not a great movie. Watchable for the uniqueness of the story line. Of course, good animation.
Rating: Average

Arasu

A kannada movie that was aired on the Volvo bus to Chennai. Really pathetic in the beginning but metamorphed into some decency by the time movie ended, especially because of a different ending.
Rating: Average

Khosla ka Ghosla

A Hindi movie. Pretty nice. Some very good dialogues. Whole story revolves around a father's cherished plot of land and the son's wishes to fly to New York. Very well taken.
Rating: Good

Pokiri

A Telugu movie and no subtitles. But still could make out the story line and some one-line dialogues. Watchable once.
Rating: Good

3 Idiots

Unofficially, based out of the theme created in the book 'Five Point Someone' by Chethan Bhagat but to be fair to the screenplay and direction, an excellent adaptation to the mainstream cinema. If FPS was good, 3I is better. It conveys a lot of messages like success follows excellence, knowledge and application is more important than rote learning, etc.

Rating: Must-see

Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay

Sequel to Harold and Kumar go to White Castle. Not very funny. Of course, ridiculous imagination and story line, like the prequel. And, definitely, not a movie for the children.
Rating: Average