Is it matter much to you that what you were in your last birth? Do you invest much on your past or in your future? Do you find your strength in outside materials, people or their words than in yourself??
Chandni Chowk to Chinais a story of Sidhu (Akshay Kumar) who is destined to live the hard way of life cutting vegetables and doing other work for a restaurant. He learned from life that if we work hard, wewill get sweat but to improve in life one need luck. His friend, brother and father is Dada (MithunChakraborty) who advise him to believe in himself, but he is in no mood andalways go behind palmists and lottery vendors. ’Luck’ however reaches to him in the form of a chinese villager’s old belief of their war hero ’Li Shiang’s rebirth. In fact that was a trick played by his ’friend’ chopstick (RanvirShorey) to make use of the situation. The China journey introduced him to Sakhi (Ms TSM/Deepika Padukone) who is a tele modelwho has lost roots in Chinaand trying to find it in any way. Backto Chinathe smuggler leader (Hojo/Gordon Liu) is controlling the villagers andusing them as slaves. The fun gamedidn’t continue much longer and the highly skilled Hojo and Sidhu is face toface. Watch Chandni Chowk to China to know more about the story.
The story didn’t have anything new to offer. We have seen the story and its various variations for several years. Decades back, we have seen Yodha, recently there had Drona with similar theme. Didn’t we have seen many a times where anold photo work as the match maker many decades back and the mimicry artistsmock it for years? Ok, CC2C is not directly relates to these movies but we can see similarity here and there. Ok, Ok, when we talk about light entertainersdo we really look for good stories? That’s right. It is a lightentertainer. It is not a full slapstick comedy, but a film with sufficient dose of comedy to label it as an Akshay Kumar film. The film has a serious track as well. Switching between comedy and serious scenes were mixed in most part, but the ending could have been much more effective. The director select for a cartoon ending which did more bad than good, given the hard efforts taken by the hero to reach the point.
Action scenes in the film are excellent. The pace is controlled very well and it is the joint effort by the action director, cinematographer and the editor. We don’t witness this excellent combination often. Even the choreography is well mixed to keep the pace and effect.
Chandni Chowk to China belongs to Akshay Kumar in all aspect. The actor is in his full spirit and tries every trick in his bag to makeit as entertainer. He succeeds in it by part though not full. When Akshay appears on screen whatever he does onscreen, keeps the audience engaged and inthis film too he do the trick. (Hehowever has to avoid repeating his own actions which after a point may let him down.) Deepika Padukone impresses the audience in her look andaction. She is in a double role and her role as Suzy with the chienese look was more impressive. Mithun Chakraborthy was wasted in a small role. (I would have preferred himto give the training to the hero than the Chinese police officer.) Gordon Liu and Roger Yuanwere good where Ranvir Shorey was cool.
Cinematography of the movie is a major plus. The movie starts with breath taking view of Great Wall of China. From there on, In each frame there had an excellent stamp and we cannot ask for more from a cinematographer. Very good!!
Music of the film is good in general, however the film lack an ’excellent’ number to make an impact. Choreography on the other hand was superb. All ofthem were colourful and well presented. The one song which mixed action was presented in extreme perfection.
The film falls short of excellence, thanks to its decade old storyline and weak screenplay. The film is a light entertainer which one may give a try for Akshay Kumar’s screen presence, action sequences, Deepika’s look and technical brilliance.
My rating: 3.25 stars