jab harry met sally

.. ek ladka-ladki kabhi dost nahi hote… said Jeevan to Prem in
Maine Pyar Kiya. It was the year 1989 when MPK had released. I wished
to watch the movie in a cinema hall, but alas! I had no one to go
with. Anyhow, I finally got to see the movie on VCR some 3-4 months
later. There was very little action in the movie, one of them was
Salman Khan [Prem] doing a do-do haath with Mohnish Behl [Jeevan] .
Before Prem and Jeevan jumped into the duel, they had a small war of
words. Jeevan was spewing venom with his incisive words while
insinuating that something was definitely on between Prem and Suman
[Bhagyashree] and he uttered the historic dialogue: ek ladka-ladki
kabhi dost nahi hote.



Innocent that I was, I did not get the meaning of it back then. I
assumed that since they were eventually going to fall in love, where
was the need for being friends and even if they were friends why did
Prem feel so hurt. Anyways, I saw the movie quite a few times and was
thoroughly entertained everytime.

In the mid 90’s cable-tv was a rage and even we got it installed.
Movies were beaming 24×7 and on one such day I caught the movie ‘When
Harry Met Sally’ on Star Movies. Just 10 minutes into the movie and
Billy Crystal spoke those ominous words:You realize of course that we
could never be friends.

I went into a tizzy, what was Harry saying! Was he out of his mind.
Harry went onto explain:



Harry: You realize of course that we could never be friends.

Sally: Why not?

Harry: What I’m saying is — and this is not a come-on in any way,
shape or form — is that men and women can’t be friends because the sex
part always gets in the way.

Sally: That’s not true. I have a number of men friends and there is no
sex involved.

Harry: No you don’t.

Sally: Yes I do.

Harry: No you don’t.

Sally: Yes I do.

Harry: You only think you do.

Sally: You say I’m having sex with these men without my knowledge?

Harry: No, what I’m saying is they all want to have sex with you.

Sally: They do not.

Harry: Do too.

Sally: They do not.

Harry: Do too.

Sally: How do you know?

Harry: Because no man can be friends with a woman that he finds
attractive. He always wants to have sex with her.

Sally: So you’re saying that a man can be friends with a woman he
finds unattractive?

Harry: No, you pretty much want to nail ‘em too.

Sally: What if they don’t want to have sex with you?

Harry: Doesn’t matter because the sex thing is already out there so
the friendship is ultimately doomed and that is the end of the story.

Sally: Well, I guess we’re not going to be friends then.

And then it all came back to me. I understood why Prem and Suman could
not be friends. And I understood what Jeevan had implied.

I did a bit of research about the release of these two movies and much
to my surprise I found that both the movies released in 1989. While
WHMS had released in July, MPK had released in December. But howcome
two people in two different parts of the globe struck the same
concept. I am still perplexed how this happened, similar thought
pattern running in two different minds from two different cultures. Of
course, the Indian version was more subtle and needed some
deciphering.

Later on in the movie, after another 10 minutes of the previous
sequence Harry makes an ammendment to his earlier proposition. The
conversation between them goes like this:

Harry: Staying over?

Sally: Yes.

Harry: Would you like to have dinner?

Harry: Just friends.

Sally: I thought you didn’t believe men and women could be friends.

Harry: When did I say that?

Sally: On the ride to New York.

Harry: No no no no, I never said that. Yes, that’s right, they can’t
be friends. Unless both of them are involved with other people then
they can. This is an amendment to the earlier rule, if the two
people are in relationships, the pressure of possibilty of involvement
is lifted. That doesn’t work either because what happens then is the
person you’re involved with can’t understand why you need to be
friends with the person you’re just friends with. Like it means
something is missing from their relationship and “why do you have to
go outside to get it?”. Then when you say, “no no no no, it’s not
true nothing’s missing from the relationship”, the person you’re
involved with then accuses you of being secretly attracted to the
person you’re just friends with, which we probably are, I mean, come
on, who the hell are we kidding, let’s face it, which brings us back
to the earlier rule before the amendment which is men and
women can’t be friends, so where does that leave us?

Sally: Harry.

Harry: What?

Sally: Goodbye.

Harry: Oh, OK.

The thought that trigerred off this post was a sequence in the movie
‘Rab Ne…’ where we had a drunk Raj/Suri rambling to himself after
Bobby had passed-out, he said ‘ladka-ladki kabhi dost nahi hote’;
implying that sooner or later Taani would fall in love with Raj. And
so, the legend of Harry-Sally lives on.

This post was first published on PFC

all khans' under fire

In a strange turn of events, all 4 Khans' of bollywood have come under fire from different quarters. While Shiv Sena took on 2 khans', Aamir and Shahrukh over the IPL issue, the other two were lambasted by different communities of Rajasthan for their irresponsible behavior.

Shiv Sena, in their mouthpiece 'Saamna', is outraged by SRK and Aamir statements over IPL. While Aamir bore the brunt because all he said was that merit should have taken precedence over nationality while selecting players for IPL, SRK went overboard in sympathising with Pakistan and said that he felt "humiliated" that no talent from Pak was picked. SRK made ridiculous excuses that he couldn't attend the auction of players. What an excuse! He is the brand ambassador of Nokia and Airtel, all he needed was to be in touch with his represntatives, but he chose not to. And now that his movie 'My Name Is Khan' is ready for release, he wants to win back his fans in Pak and Dubai. He is only serving his self-interest, as he is the co-producer of the movie and he wants to protect his fan-base in middle-east. That also serves the purpose of him dancing in lavish Dubai weddings. SRK's stand was purely a business-minded decision, and not an emotional one. The irony is that, these very people are gonna circulate the pirated cd/dvd of his movie. SRK was calling for trouble, when he went out of his way in support to Pak. Shiv Sena has called him a 'traitor' and torn down posters of his movie. I am sure they will cause problems during release of the movie too.

Now, coming to Saif Ali Khan, his involvement on 'black buck' hunting case has caused some discontent among sections of Rajasthanis who felt that he should not have been awarded the Padma Shri. Since he has not been proven innocent in the case yet, and he isn't the most deserving candidate for the award, his effigy was burnt.

Lastly, theatre screens acorss cities in Rajasthan were ransacked duty to wrong portrayal of the 'rajputana' clan in the movie 'Veer'. Hence, the mischief mongers smashed glass windows and tore down posters of Salman Khan.

London Dreams : Khuli Ankh Ka Sapna

The dope is that the premise of the movie is based on Abhimaan, except that instead of a couple we have two friends. Ajay and Sallu are both friends in different parts of the world. While Ajay, just as BigB, is popular in London as a singer of a band, Sallu plays at weddings in his hometown. But Sallu, just as Jaya Bachchan, was much more talented than Ajay.

And Ajay makes the mistake of inviting Salman to join his band. What happens next? Salman is an instant hit and a crowd puller; and nobody wants Ajay anymore. Ajay is consumed by this jealousy and big ego hurdle. He plans a vice to cut down Salman's grwoing stature. He pushes Salman into hedonistic liefstyle with booze and babes, just before a crucial concert.

While the troop movies from Paris to Amsterdam and other places, Salman slides further into this couldron of sleaze. Will he recover? Even if he does, will Ajay realise his follies? Will Salman forgive Ajay and will their friendship hold them together?

That's what the movie is about. Oh! I missed out on Asin. She is the lead dancer of the band. Ajay loves her, but she falls for the rural innocence of Salman Khan. That adds to Ajay's woes, first Sallu steals his limelight and then his ladlylove. So, who finally wins over Asin!

movies that released this diwali

this diwali has seen the release of 3 big movies, but all 3 are kinda duds. none of them have generated enough interest in me and i think i will be skipping all of them.

i actually did want to watch blue, especially because it had sanjay dutt and akshay kumar together, but the reviews have really not been good at all. sample this:

Blue, directed by Anthony D'souza is a brainless, forgettable action-thriller that quickly sinks without a trace. Let me say this right away: anyone expecting anything other than the sight of Lara Dutta in a skimpy bikini, or indeed Akshay Kumar with his shirt off, is going to be very disappointed.

And here's some more from the same review:

Blue suffers from a dull script and inane dialogue, and is cursed with characters that are as shallow as the waters they paddle.

read the review for yourself, its here.

And here's more about the movie from another review:

The plot is supposed to be full of clever twists and turns, but is nothing but preposterous. It is meant to be a razor-sharp adrenaline inducer, but throughout the nearly two-hour film you get the feeling as if you are watching an extended music video with snatches of National Geographic footage.

That review can be found here.

Now that blue was out the question, my next bet was all the best. with a starcast like that and rohit shetty directing it, i am sure it will have at least a few laughs. some good words about the movie:

Comedy is a delicate genre. It needs an accurate combination of fresh banter, palpable camaraderie and gauged response. All The Best isn't the perfect recipe for laughter but it sure has its Lever-filled moments.

read that review here.

another review that says that the movie is pretty good is here.

an excerpt from that review is below:

Tucked away beneath those pointless songs and some ridiculous, overblown action scenes is a silly yet surprisingly enjoyable tale of misunderstandings and mistaken identities. Like most Bollywood comedies these days, All The Best is far too long, but it has a winning combination of cleverly crude humour and genuine sweetness.

the weakest movie of the 3 is main aur mrs.khanna. the movie looked like a disaster from the dull trailers. and these words have confirmed my thoughts on the movie:

There are dumb scripts and dumber scripts, but Main Aurr Mrs Khanna has got to be the dumbest. You feel nothing for the film's characters because you cannot understand why they behave the way they do. It's the kind of screenplay in which every obstacle in the characters' lives could be overcome by having one sensible conversation which for some strange reason, they never have.

the full review is here.

i am not sure what i will watch, but i definitely know what to avoid.

BigB Gets Big Bucks For Hosting Big Boss

Its stale news that BigB will be anchoring Big Boss. The fresh news is that, he is commanding a whopping 1.5 crore per episode. That's like, 126 crore for the 84 episodes that he will anchor.

While SRK got paid 1 crore per episode for Panchvi Paas, which of course failed, both Salman and Akshay charge around 80lakhs per episode for 10KaDum and Khatron Ke Khiladi, respectively. But BigB, being the Big Boss gets the biggest pay packet.

All said and done, the man has some screen presence. His latest ads on tv, for the promotion of Big Boss, looks fabulous. He brings so much grace to the nauseatic reality show, in just the ad; wonder what's gonna happen in the show. Looking forward to the evictions in the show!

preity zinta does a 'kajra re'

preity zinta was found doing a kajra re number for salman's home production. the song was being shot with sohail khan. the reason for doing the song is very weird. she said that the movie is being directed by her good friend prem soni and salman has played prem umpteen number of times, so she was doing the song. phew!

anyways, checkout the pic:

srk : i'm a celebrity, get me out of here

It was not a dense jungle out there but an airport, Newark. And the task was neither to have a public bath nor eat roaches nor catch squids and put them in jars. The task was to answer a few security related questions and to prove one's credentials. Just being a bollywood star is not a recognition, what with rapists like Shiney Ahuja lurking around and druggists like Fardeen Khan roaming free and of course deer hunters like Salman Khan who not just hunts black-bucks but makes black bucks with movies like Chori Chori Chupke Chupke which was totally funded by underworld and add the trampling of poor street-sleepers under his Mitsubishi Landcruiser. So, in such a case if SRK is asked to prove his credentials and some relative/friend's name and number who can vouch for him, then what's wrong with that. And add to this the thumb rule of not being allowed to make any calls, what's wrong with that?

Hundreds and thousands of people have to undergo such security-based questioning, then why should SRK be spared. Is he not a common man for USA. Kamal Hassan was questioned, so was Mammooty and APJ Kalam. Its all done with a clean intention of security measure.

Now comes the tricky question. SRK has been frisked earlier too, he must've waited for his baggage even before this travel. So, why is he raising a hue and cry this time? Is he milking the issue to his advantage? He does not need publicity, he is a megastar. Then why is he going on and on. Kamal Hassan, APJ Kalam and others haven't revisited their experience or retold it.

This incident comes close on the heels of Emraan Hashmi claiming that he was not given housing because of his religious background. Later it was clarified that the owner was not interested in selling the proprety since his son has decided to settle in Mumbai. A case was then filed against Emraan Hashmi for reverse-discrimination.

Coming back to SRK, he wanted special treatment at the airport. But what for? Hasn't he seen Sarfarosh where an ambassador of art and culture turns out to be the culprit. Moreover, when will we Indians get out of the habit of tu jaanta nahi mere baap ko or tu jaanta hai mai kaun hoon?

Instead of crying foul we should make our security measures stringent. We should frisk any outsider/foreigner and then garland them; be it Bill Clinton or Brad Pitt.

As for SRK, he was let off free; but obviously. And he is making a big deal of it. It has already generated publicty and created a buzz for his new movie My Name Is Khan where he plays an autistic man who is harrassed by the security keepers of US only because his name is Khan ... xyz Khan