Dil to bachha hai ji : Not for the "Dhobi Ghat" fans :)

        If you are not one of those who literally calculates ROI on every penny spent you can very well spend some bucks at the multiplex for this Madhu Bhandarkar RomCom.This movie is definitely not some milestone in the romantic comedy genre but it has its moments of success and provides some light entertainment which is welcome on a friday night.The movie stars Ajay Devgan,Emran Hashmi and Omi Vaidya of the "3 idiots" fame as three real life characters of completely different shades.What makes the movie thoroughly enjoyable is the turn of events in their love life and the natural humour that flows in every conversation and events that unfold.
The three "Not-so-popular" female leads complement their counterparts well enough except Shruti Hasan who can be a case study in bad acting.Her artificiality makes every moment of the movie unbearable that has her screen presence.Shazahn Padamsee as June Pinto is thoroughly cute and loveable but could have shown some restraint in the excitement in her acting.Omi is good in his own style from '3 idiots' but Ajay Devgan steals the show with his priceless expressions of a divorced mid 30 executive who is fighting mid-life crisis.Specially the scene makes you burst into laughter where he struggles to decipher what June(her teenage secretary) meant when she mentions about her friend losing 'V'.Every small moment where he becomes happy at June being appreciative about his shirt or his new look is perfectly done and provide for some good laughs.Emran hashmi's typecasting as playboy has become so pervasive that even an experimental filmmaker like Bhandarkar fails to think otherwise.Dialogues by Sanjay Chhel is fresh and keeps on injecting regular doses of laughter even at places where the screeplay fails to impress.
The movie loses its steam in the second half where events become repetitive and the script weak.I will leave the end of the movie for you to watch and decide as opinions might vary on the ending.Pritam once again impresses with some lovely music and specially the track 'Aj kuch dino se lag raha he' brings to life that romantic in you.Overall, some nice entertainment from a serious filmmaker who makes the switch from some no-nonsense movie-making to romantic comdey quite smoothly.So if you really want to have some light hearted entertainment, go and watch this movie with your buddies and definitely every guy out there will find some incident to relate to from your love life.

Dhobi Ghat : 96 minutes of nothing

If 'Dhobi Ghat' is a piece of art I am happy that I am not an artist.On a friday evening 6 of us went to watch the movie.Excitement was obvious considering the fact that it is a Amir Khan production,the same house has delivered 'Peepli Live'.Once the movie started, the abstract feeling started to sink in but we were hoping for something to happen and waiting eagerly marvelling at Kiran Rao's skill of storytelling.But soon we realised that it will be a test of patience.I tried hard but could not find a plot in the movie.Absence of proper script added to the mess.Only aspect which can deserve a word of appreciation is cinematography.The movie is beautifully shot in the suburbs of mumbai and the cinematographer has captured every nuances of day-to-day life of the different strata of society on his canvas.The movie tells us the story of three person:1)A dhobi-cum-rat killer who keeps on chasing his dream of becoming a model2)An investment banker 'Shai' on sabbatical in India who just clicks photos of Mumbai.3)An artist who watches the video diary of some lady that he had stumbled upon while moving into his new house, for the entire duration .Now though we are shown some kind of connection between these three people but there is actually no relation in the three plots.The director shows all the three plots interchangeably without any real progress in the story.Still I do not understand the ending of 'Dhobi Ghat' and i will prefer to keep it that way as I do not want to undergo the whole experience once again.The performances definitely deserve a mention.Prateek Babbar is here to stay and has done complete justice to his character.Monica Dogra is cute as 'Shai'.Kriti Malhotra pulls of 'Yasmin' with elan.The music is good and is the only thing that stays with you after the movie.All I can say is that 'Dhobi Ghat' might impress the intelligentsia but is defintely a weak attempt at producing arthouse movie.It is dull,dreary and boring.You can definitely give it a miss even if you don't have anything to do.

In the year 2000 when I was in standard 10th the buzzword in career management was IT.Even if you were one of those lazy bums you would have known that something big is happening and that's IT.The Y2K fever was at its peak and even people able to identfy Java as something related to programming rather than something assosciated with coffee got a chance to pay a visit to Uncle Sam's land.Engineers were no longer the only privileged ones to get into IT sector.Graduates from all streams had already joined the bandwagon after completing some fancy course from those over-hyped IT institutes that made some quick buck.Indian IT companies saw some massive growth defying all laws of business.Basically India was shining.
But as it goes good time does not last a lifetime.Y2K bubble burst and then 9/11 happened which saw massive number of IT professionals returning back to India.But the impact IT industry had created on aspiring engineers was there to stay.Many overnight success stories had to close shop but the power houses of Indian IT sector which had a diverse business profile and was just not a by-product of Y2K bubble were resilient to this downturn.Growth rates became more realistic and sustainable.The madness was gone but the impression was made.The verdict was out.IT was here to stay and stay big.
This entire craze had a big impact on shaping my career.When the decision was to be made in 2002 on my future course after high school I became biased towards engineering so that I can join the supposedly elite group of software engineers.Engineering stream did not matter any more as IT companies were ready to pick up any engineering graduate and cast them into their mold.The downturn was gradually fading and the IT industry emerged stronger.But what nobody noticed was that other educational streams suffered major blow.Even students not interested in engineering had to dump science streams because of peer as well as parental pressure.The problem was everybody wanted a pie of IT.This led to engineering colleges getting established in every streets of India and obviously quality was compromised.Nobody complained as all parties were happy.Parents could pay and transform their children into engineers,colleges could make quick money,industry was getting qualified workforce if not talented and government was riding on this success.
Even I was overawed by the glamour of IT industry and refused to join any other sector.Money was good and even academically run-of the mill students had a chance to go abroad as soon as they joined the industry.IT industry soon became crowded and the gloss started fading.Money and a trip abroad started drying up.But people had no choice as once you are into this madness for few years it is very difficult to join any other sector.Most of the work happening in this industry in the services sector(where majority of the workforce is employed) is not intelligence intensive.It does not allow you to think and gradually cripples your brain.Suddenly you realise that a grand mistake have been made in your life and there is no way that it can be undone.After all control+z does not work in life.Everything is predictable and monotonous here.It leaves you with nothing but frustration as it has done to me.Frustration of not able to do something meaningful or something that gives you satisfaction.
I have realized that this is not a Hollywood movie where I have a time machine at my disposal so that I can re-design my career.The curse of IT has spelled its doom.But it is up to us to decide whether we want it to take control of your life.IT is not bigger than life.I am not biased against any industry.But just a word of caution.All that glitters is not gold.The upcoming students of India should really invest some time to find out what is their cup of tea rather than blindly jumping into the already overcrowded boat.I have figured out that there are lot of meaningful things to do in this world than wasting time,energy and gray matter in this industry.Have you?