Movie Review: Hero Wanted

What happens when a trash truck driver falls madly in love with a beautiful bank teller? Is able to muster up the courage to go and talk to her? Or will he pull some stupid stunt and cause a whole bunch of trouble?

That is the story of this movie I watched on Youtube. Cuba Gooding plays the role of Liam Case a trash truck driver who has recently lost his pregnant wife in an accident. One day Case is on his lunch break mulling over wife's memory he witnesses an accident in which a little girl is trapped inside a burning car. He jumps in and rescues the girl and becomes an instant Hero.

Case is madly infatuated with a bank teller and he devises a complicated plan to win her affection. He requests his friend to cause some trouble in the bank and he would scare him away and become a hero in front of her. This would help him win her affection and thus get his stable life back. Things go wrong, Case is double crossed and in the scuffle few people get hurt including the love of his life. An enraged Case starts taking revenge by eliminating the four people who were involved in the robbery.

What happens is the rest of the story. Is Case successful in getting his revenge? Will he win the love of his life? Will he get his life back in control? Watch the movie to know more. It is available free on Youtube.

Hindi Movie Review: Karma

This movie starring Jackie Shroff, Anil Kapoor and Naseeruddin Shah was released in 1986 and was a moderate hit at that time. The movie follows the theme of the legendary movie Sholay. Dilip Kumar plays the role of a compassionate jailer, Anupam Kher plays notorious terrorist commander Dr. Deng who gets arrested and placed the former's jail. In one of the interactions Dilip Kumar slaps Dr. Deng and earns his enemity. An angry Dr. Deng organizes his terrorist group and massacres the entire jail residents and Dilip Kumar's family.

In response Dilip Kumar decides to take revenge and he picks up three convicts in jail and trains them into fighting machines. Together they destroy Dr. Deng's empire and camps and eliminate him. Thus eliminating all the threats to India. This is one of the formula movies of Bollywood. Three heroes, two heroines, a villain and supporting actor. Five songs, couple of attempted rape scenes, etc. It is worth watching once and does definitely inflame passions for the country.

Kannada Movie Review: Mylari

Complete family entertainer from Shivanna!

I have said in this blog and elsewhere time and again that since the early 2000s the quality of Sandalwood movies has significantly improved. There is some real meat in the story, there are great and truly hummable songs without any double meaning. Then of course the acting and direction seems to have matured. Then of course there are a brood of imported heroines from other states who are vying for top spot in Sandalwood. All this means good entertainment for the average cine-goer in Karnataka. Hopefully now Kannadigas will start watching Kannada movies instead of patronizing other language movies.

Anyway coming to this movie, the central character Mylari (Shivrajkumar) is the older son of a rural farmer. He is not interested in studies and his father has to continuously coax, threaten, beat, plead with him to go to school. On the contrary his younger brother is a brilliant student who is doing great in school. This of course leads to discrimination from father and illtreatment of the older son. Then there is Anitha the heroine who is the village headman's daughter. She goes to the same school as Mylari and both of them are in love from childhood but neither has the courage to express it. So Mylari does the best he can, he writes his feelings in the form of poetry, and prose literature and becomes a great poet. His father of course doesn't appreciate it.

Finally one day Mylari comes to know that Anitha is getting engaged to someone else and takes the step to express his love. This leads to lot of complications and results in getting him thrown out of the house. He ends up in Bangalore and there starts the real saga. He hooks up with his old friend who has become a famous journalist in Bangalore. The latter gets him a job as a journalist/ writer and then the trouble starts. As a press reporter Mylari breaks some important stories against prominent political figures. The political leader threatens Mylari's friend and since nothing comes out of it he eliminates the entire family.

An enraged Mylari goes on a killing spree and eliminates the politician and his henchmen. Then he is arrested and sentenced to death by hanging. The entire story is said as a flash back. It is definitely worth watching and can be watched with the whole family. There are some real touching scenes in the movies, that have been excellently executed by the main actors.

Kannada Movie Review: Buddhivanta

Laughter Riot
 
Upendra starrer Buddhivanta (2008) is a movie in which Upendra has lucidly executed his role. The movie starts off with several people coming to lodge complaints with the police against one individual who has cheated their sisters off the money by entering into a fake marriage with them. When they compare the pictures of the complainant all of them have the same picture. The police are convinced that they are dealing with the same person who is masquareding as different individuals and taking the people for a ride. They are hot on pursuit for this individual. There is a bus accident and all the passengers are admitted into the hospital, when police come to investigate they find the culprit among the injured. The police arrest the accused and present him to court.
 
The rest of the movie is a courtroom drama with Upendra the hero effectively arguing his case against all the women. The judge played by Lakshmi has pretty much no role except to sit there and watch. The heroine Pooja Gandhi also doesn't have much role except for running behind Upendra like a mad woman. Towards the end of the movie it is revealed who Upendra really is and why he went into disguise and what he hoped to achieve by doing what he did.
 
I would say this is a complete family entertainer with a generous dose of comedy included. It is totally watchable once.