The holiday season is ending and producers are keen to take advantage even though they are wary of the ongoing IPL circus which goes right till the end of May. I think this school and college holiday syndrome is overrated. I find more students in theatres digging into their lunch boxes when they're supposed to be attending classes than during summer or winter holidays. Anyway, two films with big stars are lined up for release, Ganesh's “Kool” and Puneet's “Hudugaru”.
There were undercurrents of a tussle about the release dates but now “Hudugaru” is getting released on April 29th with “Kool” following a week later. The former is the remake of the Tamil hit, “Nadodigal” and stars Puneet, Kitty, Yogi and Radhika Pandit. You could call it a multi-starrer of sorts. Puneet loved the original and bought the remake rights for a small fortune. It's not the typical Puneet film. It's a film about friendship, love and sacrifice. The other two heroes have prominent roles too. Ganesh inadvertently turned director with “Kool” thanks to a tiff with Chandru who was supposed to direct the film. Accusations were exchanged but Ganesh stuck to his guns and picked up the megaphone. It's not an easy decision to take and we'll know in a couple of weeks whether it was the right one or not. It will be a visual treat with Ratnavelu wielding the camera. Harikrishna's tunes are already popular. Ganesh's spunky wife Shilpa is the producer.
Don't ask me what “Ko” means but the Tamil film directed by K.V. Anand is a huge hit and is pretty interesting. Anand was a press photographer once and lives out his fantasies through this film. Jeeva plays a shutterbug who gets unbelievable scoops while performing impossible stunts on his bike, has two pretty girls falling for him, soothes the ruffled feathers of political bigwigs and helps a young friend become Chief Minister. The first half is pretty ordinary but an interesting twist in the second half lifts the film. Anand was so confident about his script that he had the gumption to sack Simbu who was his original choice when he insisted he wanted the heroine changed. Karthika, yesteryear star Radha's daughter makes a confident debut. She's extremely restrained even though the other heroine Pia is garrulous and screams for attention. The talented Jeeva is definitely a better choice than Simbu. The ambience in a newspaper office is recognizable. There are some interesting characters like the associate editor referred to as ‘ass' and the aging chief photographer who's never satisfied with the hero's work. A nice touch is when the film critic doles out a single star to Anand's previous film, “Ayyan”. Since the film is a hit await inferior clones in other languages if you don't understand Tamil.
In the ‘80s the most insipid reason I heard for Kamal Hassan's Hindi films flopping was that he sported a moustache. Today, suddenly the mush signifies macho in Mumbai. Everyone from the baby face Imran Khan, his uncle Aamir to Ajay Devgan and Salman are sporting handlebar moustaches. I'm wondering if this will dilute their talent!
