Dang, yo! Amitabh burns up the screen in Trishul! He is a one-man wrecking machine as he fulfills his oedipal Angry Young Man destiny. ( Let me tell you more about his suits with the big check prints on them. )

Overall, I really enjoyed this. It had plenty of romance, dishoom-dishoom, socialist messages about money not being worth selling your soul for, feminist messages about how ladies can do stuff, AND lots of shots of Shashi and Amitabh with their shirts unbuttoned to the navel. How could you lose?!

I watched Trishul last night. (LOVED IT! Review coming later today...) The music was okay, but when this song began, I got chills just from hearing Kishore's voice. A very lovely song and sweetly picturized on Amitabh, The Shash, and Hema with Rakhee lurking in the background.

Prem Kahani was filled with poetry. Here is a little ditty that I think is appropriate to describe my feelings about it:

Hens love roosters, geese love ganders, everyone else loves Ned FlandersRajesh Khanna...

NOT ME!

Oh, god, this was a tiring film. Rajesh Khanna's bloated super-star ego had EVERYONE in love with him. ( Screencaps and some teeny spoilers under here... )

And in conclusion:

Well, I suppose it's official: I am a Manoj Kumar fan.



(I'm making this face right now.)

While watching Roti Kapada aur Makaan, I had such sympathy for Manoj Kumar, beyond sympathy for his character, who was quite nice and broody. Seeing the effort and detail that goes into a Manoj Kumar production, I was overcome with a sense of outrage that Farah Khan would mock him so meanly in Om Shanti Om. That was when I knew I was an official Fan (tm). Where are the earnest young (handsome) men making films like this today? Politics, romance, melodrama, action, and some wonderful songs all wrapped into one package. Rang de Basanti comes close to a Manoj Kumar production. I need to rewatch that, I think.

Roti Kapada aur Makaan is a wonderfully intricate story of a guy named Bharat (natch!) who can't get a job in 1974. The story spreads out to encompass Bharat's brothers and his sister and his lady friends, but leaving out the parents in a very modern way.

( Follow me for more Manoj Kumar plus The Shashinator in some excellent 70s suits. )

Vah vah! Kya masterpiece he! Deewar is a straight up drama with only a little dash of action and an even smaller bit of romance mixed in. The three pillars of the story are The Shash and Amitabh, as brothers on opposite sides of the law, and their mother.

( Knowing the plot shouldn't really ruin the movie for you... we all know this story! )