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Post by rose on Oct 29, 2014 5:41:11 GMT
Which brings me to the one logical flaw in the film that I, a diehard fan, couldn't overlook. Why does Rajveer approach Harleen and get her embroiled in this mess in the first place? He tells her later that he has never been responsible for the death of an innocent, so he is going to offer her his protection, which explains the rest of the movie, but there is no good explanation for why he gets the innocent party involved to begin with. I know we are supposed to think that it is love at first sight, but that does not seem to be in character for a canny guy like him. I wish they had done something different with this, like, say, he is hiding in her car to avoid the goons, but then she gets into the car and drives off before he has a chance to sneak out, and thereby she gets involved, or something along those lines. This whole "I see your face and I am immediately so enamoured that all judgment goes out the window" is too hackneyed and needs to be retired. I'll admit, I have a lot of tolerance for the love at first sight plot, but I really don't think it's a logical flaw here. This was apparently Rajveer's first mission being a secret opt and not a military opt. So I don't think it's too out there to say he mind wasn't fully "in it"? He also made the mistake about not venting the server who was supposed to bring the drugged drinks. And letting Harleen get her hands on his cell phone. I find the idea that that the chases didn't kill a single innocent to be the logical flaw. No way all that killed no one. Not that I don't agree they could have had them meet cute in a better more creative way. But I found the first date scene really funny
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Post by newbiefan on Oct 29, 2014 14:35:30 GMT
Which brings me to the one logical flaw in the film that I, a diehard fan, couldn't overlook. Why does Rajveer approach Harleen and get her embroiled in this mess in the first place? He tells her later that he has never been responsible for the death of an innocent, so he is going to offer her his protection, which explains the rest of the movie, but there is no good explanation for why he gets the innocent party involved to begin with. I know we are supposed to think that it is love at first sight, but that does not seem to be in character for a canny guy like him. I wish they had done something different with this, like, say, he is hiding in her car to avoid the goons, but then she gets into the car and drives off before he has a chance to sneak out, and thereby she gets involved, or something along those lines. This whole "I see your face and I am immediately so enamoured that all judgment goes out the window" is too hackneyed and needs to be retired. I'll admit, I have a lot of tolerance for the love at first sight plot, but I really don't think it's a logical flaw here. This was apparently Rajveer's first mission being a secret opt and not a military opt. So I don't think it's too out there to say he mind wasn't fully "in it"? He also made the mistake about not venting the server who was supposed to bring the drugged drinks. And letting Harleen get her hands on his cell phone. I find the idea that that the chases didn't kill a single innocent to be the logical flaw. No way all that killed no one. Not that I don't agree they could have had them meet cute in a better more creative way. But I found the first date scene really funny
Was it? He does claim that he has a bunch of secret hideouts all over the place, and the one in Burma got blown up last month. Was he lying there to impress Harleen? I know there is the backstory that seems to imply that he took up this line of work only after the Jimmy Shergill incident in London, but his overall demeanor did not suggest a newbie who is still learning the ropes. Even if he was a newbie, he should have known better than to unnecessarily involve a civilian in this and create complications for everyone. However, I do agree that the first date was funny. When he's lying through his teeth about his grandma getting transferred to the great beyond I snorted with laughter.
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Post by rose on Oct 30, 2014 0:04:21 GMT
I'll admit, I have a lot of tolerance for the love at first sight plot, but I really don't think it's a logical flaw here. This was apparently Rajveer's first mission being a secret opt and not a military opt. So I don't think it's too out there to say he mind wasn't fully "in it"? He also made the mistake about not venting the server who was supposed to bring the drugged drinks. And letting Harleen get her hands on his cell phone. I find the idea that that the chases didn't kill a single innocent to be the logical flaw. No way all that killed no one. Not that I don't agree they could have had them meet cute in a better more creative way. But I found the first date scene really funny
Was it? He does claim that he has a bunch of secret hideouts all over the place, and the one in Burma got blown up last month. Was he lying there to impress Harleen? I know there is the backstory that seems to imply that he took up this line of work only after the Jimmy Shergill incident in London, but his overall demeanor did not suggest a newbie who is still learning the ropes. Even if he was a newbie, he should have known better than to unnecessarily involve a civilian in this and create complications for everyone. However, I do agree that the first date was funny. When he's lying through his teeth about his grandma getting transferred to the great beyond I snorted with laughter.
He was working for both the Indian and British government, so the hideout locales were probably given to him
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Post by newbiefan on Oct 30, 2014 2:42:39 GMT
Was it? He does claim that he has a bunch of secret hideouts all over the place, and the one in Burma got blown up last month. Was he lying there to impress Harleen? I know there is the backstory that seems to imply that he took up this line of work only after the Jimmy Shergill incident in London, but his overall demeanor did not suggest a newbie who is still learning the ropes. Even if he was a newbie, he should have known better than to unnecessarily involve a civilian in this and create complications for everyone. However, I do agree that the first date was funny. When he's lying through his teeth about his grandma getting transferred to the great beyond I snorted with laughter.
He was working for both the Indian and British government, so the hideout locales were probably given to him Yes, he works for the two governments, but he also makes it clear that he does not trust all government agents indiscriminately. From this I got the impression that if he has hideouts where no one can track him, like the Zorawar Kalra guy who is ostensibly a government agent and has access to a lot of government documents and information, but doesn't know about Rajveer's location at the island hideout, then Rajveer has probably played a part in setting up this hideout himself and hasn't necessarily shared this information with his handlers. Setting up 12 such places can't have happened overnight, and if one hideout got blown up a month ago, he must have been in the business at least for a while prior to the incident.
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odadune
Star of the item number
not around much due to stuff in my personal life.
Posts: 1,494
Favorite actor: Currently a certain Kumar, but I like most of them
Favorite actress: whoever's in films I'm interested in this week
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Post by odadune on Jan 10, 2015 3:29:35 GMT
First off, I have say, the advertising attempts to spin this as some kind of slick, western-style action film were very misleading. The insane troll logic of the espionage plot and the more mediocre pieces of action choreography reminded me of some of the schlocky early 00s action films I've seen, like Khiladi 420 or Suneel Darshan's Talaash: The Hunt Begins (not to be confused with Reema Kagti's Talaash, even though they both have Kareena in them), only with better production values and less chauvinism.
For me, the redeeming traits were the emotional parts, which were a bit cheesy but heartfelt and likable, the location shooting, which was stunning, and some of the humor and action. Generally I found the hand-to-hand and water stunts pretty well-done and some of the parkour interesting, but the gunplay extremely tiresome and the vehicle stunts very uneven. Katrina for me was like the action stunts: pretty good in some parts (when she's just being ditzy and cute without throwing tantrums, she's hilarious) and pretty bad in others. It's really hard to root for the character who *doesn't* want to go along with An Adventure, and even though intellectually I understood where her character was coming from, all the times where she decides that Hrithik is A VERY BAD MAN and her ENEMY, just came off as annoying tantrums.
Maybe this played better in Knight and Day, since Tom Cruise does shifty and slightly deranged pretty well, and maybe it would have played better with a male Bollywood lead who was a bit harder edged, but I mean, this is Hrithik, and not Agneepath's Hrithik either, there was no question in this viewer's mind that Jai was going to turn out to be a basically upstanding guy. Hrithik comes off here (as in Zindagi Na Milega Dobara) who's good at his job but bossy and patronizing (in a harmless and amusing way) in social situations and a big romantic sillyface at heart. (For some reason I imagine Hrithik being like this in real life as well, although I don't know why.)
I dunno, I think if I had been in the producer's shoes, I would have either pushed for either a darker, edgier take on Jai and Harleen (in the sense of her being drawn to his personality and lifestyle) and the story overall, or gone for more of a cheeky masala parody approach. As it stands, I would say that the good parts are good enough to make it worthwhile for anyone who likes the main leads and wants to see them in a bit of amusing fluff, or wants to see a schlocky old school action masala that actually revolves (if in a wobbly way) around the heroine's personal development. But man, the parts where the action director goes on vacation are kind of a drag and the parts where Katrina starts squawking and carrying on about how she's DOOMED DOOMED like C3P0 in the Star Wars are even more so. In all fairness, I think a lot of other female Bollywood stars with more respected acting abilities would have been equally bad in those scenes.
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Post by MrB on Jan 11, 2015 9:25:25 GMT
Rewatched this last night to see if a second viewing gave a more favourable impression. Sadly not.
Odadune's point about it being mis-sold as a Western-style action flick is a good one, as that made me unable to forgive its low opinion of the audience's intelligence. Right in the opening scene, for example, it rubbed me up the wrong way by claiming to be in London and then having Jimmy Shergill arrive in a helicopter flying over the desert - global warming is a scourge of our times, but things are not quite that bad yet. And three times Hrithik escapes his pursuers by jumping to what ought to be certain death and emerging miraculously unhurt (though at least they have the grace in one case to have the baddies explain that that's exactly what will happen). It's OK for the hero to be lucky, but he shouldn't rely on it.
Films like Players are much more inconsistent, yet I happily forgive them as they clearly set themselves in nonsense territory. Bang Bang had pretensions to something else, and failed to live up to them.
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Post by James on Jan 14, 2015 3:18:24 GMT
There was something about the motivation of Hritik's character that felt very 90s Hindi action film to me. The whole idea of avenging a wrongfully killed (insert relation here) was a staple of those movies, and like those movies, this one had a lot of holes in the quality of the script and the realism of the action. It definitely did not have the feel of a Western-style action flick to me, even if the whole revenge genre exists here, too. I wonder if the Western-style action flick comparison was more a reference to the quality of the graphics than anything else? Or the modern characteristics of the female character? Or they could have just used it as a marketing buzz-word? Or they just failed to live up to the target as you rightly mention, MrB.
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lydia
Junior artiste
Posts: 58
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Post by lydia on Jan 14, 2015 11:20:15 GMT
This film reminded me of Romancing the Stone (1984). Repressed woman with a boring life meets an exciting (mysterious) man who sweeps her off on a great, action packed adventure in search of a precious stone. In essence RTS was a romantic, comedy action film which was appropriately tongue-in-cheek. Not so Bang Bang which plays the silly romantic premise in earnest then goes the way of the serious, patriotic 'surprise' ending (somewhat like Wanted). The result is underwhelming... not masala, not drama, not romance, not comedy.....let's just look at Hrithik and Katrina yet again because they are gorgeous.
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odadune
Star of the item number
not around much due to stuff in my personal life.
Posts: 1,494
Favorite actor: Currently a certain Kumar, but I like most of them
Favorite actress: whoever's in films I'm interested in this week
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Post by odadune on Jan 14, 2015 12:47:38 GMT
That's a fair comparison, I think. Although I remember being kind of annoyed with the heroine in RTS in the early stages of the plot too. It's Bilbo Baggins Syndrome-if the protagonist is trying to prevent the plot from moving forward, a lot of people are going to be annoyed by that, and the only workaround is to get the protagonist onboard with Having An Adventure as quickly as possible.
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