A movie that doesn’t make you think or laugh - is not worth its popcorn.
36 China Town does all that and more.
You begin by ogling – the sheer hunkiness of the hawt hawt Upen Patel.
Boyoboy!
The only star on the Indian firmament who can hold his own against the likes of John Abraham (in my opinion, the only Indian Marlon Brando we have), Saif Ali Khan, Sanjay Dutt et al. Upen is a man’s man, a woman’s man.
Fella can’t act for nuts, but Who Cares? Sigh!
And before this becomes a review of Upen Patel lemme move onto the movie itself.
So first you get a good dose of eye candy – yummy UP, yummy, yummy. Then you are landed with Shahid Kapoor, who may well become the next SRK King Khan. He is cute, and funny, and he is cute. He has great body language and excellent comic timing - shoud consider taking up comedy roles full time. And before the men feel left out, comes along Kareena Kapoor, who looks scrumptious, indeed, the best I have ever seen her look.
So 36CT makes you slurp and it makes you lech.
And then it tickles your funny bone. Who else, but the master Paresh Rawal and THE Johnny Lever. I laughed till I choked, till there were tears streaming down my face.
I LMAO, folks :)
And once you have barely found your way back to your chair, comes a competent whodunits . It’s a classic murder mystery – with a classic murderer. Rich gal is killed, 6 suspects, 6 motives, no alibis. Who could it be?
So comes along Akshaye Khanna to solve the mystery. He sports a nice toupee, trademark intensity, and acting that is bang on. Considering his name was first on the rolls, he makes an appearance only after the interval. And his wife is the surprise packet of the movie.
Music is foot tapping, also doing well on the charts I believe. And the film has its high points for humour, suspense, and it is rocking entertainment. What I noticed about this movie was:
1. When there was a smoldering song, and it showed Kareena at her oomphiest best, instead of showing the puny Shahid, they set her off with the HAWT UP. Considering she was paired with Shahid, I thought it’s a good wake up call to Shahid to build up the beef like UP seems to have done such a marvelous job.
2. Shot pans to Mumbai and we see Scottish mountains in all their splendor. Being a die hard Mumbai-ite I don’t mind one bit if you glamorize my city, but hey, the Indian janta is not stoopid, yaar!
3. Awesome sets, nice china town feel about the songs, glossy GQ look of the movie.
4. I really liked Akshaye Khanna’s assistant lighting his cigarette.
5. I liked the li’l baby in the movie – v cute.
6. I lurved Kareena’s wardrobe, as usual
PL don’t hesitate to take children and elders, v clean and highly entertaining. And do what we did – we entered the hall with a humungous tray of popcorn and colas. And forgot to eat it half way :)
And just read the scorching reviews 36 CT got from other reviewers - and can only say one thing. Even though I agree it had many flaws in the logic of the plot - I had a GREAT time watching this movie.