Friday afternoon six of us went to see the Memento remake Ghajini, a new big-budget picture starring my fave Indian star, Aamir Khan. Bollywood movies know no shame. They aim to please. The three-hour Ghajini<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghajini_(2008_film)>did not disappoint.
It's Memento on steroids, literally, as Khan has bulked up nicely. He's a revenge-crazed short-term amnesiac out to kill villainous thug Ghajini in one story, and in the flashback he's a clean-cut mobile phone CEO pretending to be regular guy in order to romance a sweet young model. Bad things happen, needless to say. Like many Bollywood pictures, Ghajini is two movies in one: a violent action thriller for boys, a romance with love songs for girls. And the percussive score by A.R. Rahman <http://www.arrahman.com/> drives the emotions, as usual. In short (and the movie is three hours), three middle-aged women, one middle-aged film critic and two college girls all had a blast. One high-minded friend of mine has complained that Slumdog Millionaire is "melodramatic." (That charge has also been lobbed at Darren Aronofsky's hugely entertaining The Wrestler<http://www.kcrw.com/etc/programs/tt/tt081224darren_aronofsky>.) Sure--Slumdog's Danny Boyle and Simon Beaufoy borrowed a few tricks from Bollywood, mixing up cultures, west and east, letting Rahman go for broke with the music, seeking to entertain. Is that so bad? These Bollywood movies often throw in everything but the kitchen sink. Their movie stars are still bigger than life, gorgeous, sexy, romantic, heroic. They not only stay in shape to do action scenes, but to dance as well. As preposterous and over-the-top as these movies can be, they are almost always fun in a way few Hollywood movies ever are these days. http://weblogs.variety.com/thompsononhollywood/2008/12/bollywoods-ghaj.html -- regards, Vithur
