Apologies to everyone who feels that this review is coming very late in the day… the movies has released long back, half of India has already watched it, and even more it seems have written reviews about it on MS and other sites.
Honestly I was never sure of this movie, since I am not a fan of Karan Johar style movies and it was only the outstanding reviews at MS and everywhere else that I chose to go for the film. Plainly put it was a total disappointment.
The film has been praised as a phenomenal combination of amazing direction, new cutting edge cinematography, international standard filming, brilliant performances and powerful dialogues along with a good screenplay. Here’s what I felt:
Direction: Good but NOTHING GREAT
Performances: Kareena is OUTSTANDING. Vivek is good. Everyone else is totally average
Dialogues: Were there any?
Screenplay: Pathetic
What I expected to be a skillfully made movie turned out to be a totally clichéd, average film full of tried and tested formulas. Not only is the script predictable, the dialogues at several instances are totally cheesy and are sure to make you slap your forehead many times.
Kurbaan is a story of a few pissed off Afghanis who hate America for whatever they have done to their country and now want to take revenge by bombing a few tube stations. The concept itself was quite stupid and immature:(a) It is so not original, (b) These guys are angry more because of how American bombings have affected their personal lives and how in general it is hurting their religious pride. This sounds like too shallow a reason that would motivate them to wage jihad. At least it is not built upon in the film. You do not feel any connect with the terrorists(even more so with Saif’s character). The way everybody acts it really seems they are jealous of the American life and how different the Americans are from them(c) These individuals are led by a person simply called Bhai-Jaan**(Cliché no 1) played by Om Puri, who does all the plotting & planning, manages to get abundant explosives, make amazing bombs, even blow up a plane. all this without any conceivable help form a larger terrorist group. I think the director must have thought the audience would have to wrack their brains too much if anything logical was shown, so no point going there.
So the movie, although with a global issue as the backdrop, becomes a personal tale of few characters with whom you just cannot empathize with.
What upsets me most is that the people behind the movie take us audience for granted and make horrendous bloopers and use formulas, and expect us to not notice them.
Firstly the whole “gang” led by our stereotypes Bhai-jaan look really… stereotypical. They use around the words like allah ka karam, allah ka Maksad, hamara mulk, hamari kaum ke upar nainsaafi etc etc so loosely, it sounds fake and immature. There is even a “Main tumhare bacche ki maa banana wali” hun type of scene, when Kareena tells Saif – “Maar dalao mujhe… aur apne hone wale bacche ko bhi”. I really don’t understand how men in Bollywood, can never tell they are impregnating their women.
Then there is a totally unnecessary scene where Saif is shot and he comes home and asks Kareena to take out the bullet and SEW the wound back! Kareena tries her best to take the bullet out(which according to the oldest formula in Bollywood is enough to heal a bullet wound) and saif all this while cringes and aches in pain – totally artificial and sad acting by both in this irrelevant scene.
And given that this is a thriller, there are these stereotypical scenes which are beyond stupidity.
Like for example Vivek oberoi finds out about the names of the station where the bombs will go off. He calls the FBI guy, chats with him for 2 mins, tells him to come and meet him at such and such location at certain time and does NOT tell him the station names. He says “I will tell you when we meet”… arre bol dega to picture khatam ho jayegi lagta hai. Then there is a scene when Kareena needs to make an urgent phone call and goes to the washroom to make the call… guess what, there is no signal!
In another mindless scene, Kareena has to find out about the stations that are going to be bombed. Saif very conveniently has a detailed map, with the relevant stations clearly marked out. And he keeps this in an open desk drawer. Now kareena gets hold of this map(obviously) and has a few seconds with the map to find out the names of the stations. Get this, she actually takes out a pen and paper and WRITES DOWN 4 station names. She is a professor at NYU and cannot memorize 4 station NAMES. All this was just done so that there can be another so called “thrilling” scene, involving how she passes on the paper to Vivek Oberoi. Totally Silly and formulae.
To test Vivek Oberoi’s loyalty, the “gang” drives down to a sandwich place and Om puri tells Vivek to shoot the attendant there! Yes let me get this straight – a gang which is going to blow up trains in the US is going about pointing guns at random sandwich places as if the technology of CCTV cameras has not reached the American continent yet. Vivek saves the scene by some brilliant acting after that but cumon… who thought of the idea? Al-Qaida eat your heart out.
Continued in the comments section.