Kurbaan (D'Silva, 2009)

[kaytee]

All of a sudden, Indian directors to tackle the American terrorism story and this looks no different. It feels like Dil Se set in US of A.

http://www.bollywoodhungama.com/broadband/video/Movie-Promos/gN7yVP65/3/Theatrical-Trailer-Kurbaan.html

[sandeep]

K Jo's next production, though it seems to clash with his 'My name is Khan'

[shariqq]

I'm tired of all these new half-baked directors that "K-Jo" is putting up on the screen. What a waste. Atleast get them to the mark. It's only giving us more bad movies.

The really talented directors who made their debut with actual good movies had nothing to do with big production money (A Wednesday, Black Friday, Maqbool, etc).

[sandeep]

Its a tricky one to comment on, so I will keep it short... Loved the direction, but thought the story was weak. Too many loopholes and flaws hindered the movie which had a lot going for it. That aside, the performances were great and so was the backdrop. Nice music, but a bit long at 2hr 38 minutes for such a film. Overall it was not a bad film but it could have been much much better.

2.5/5

[shariqq]

The movie is an adaptation of New York, but with better performances by the lead pair, and a far inferior performance by the "third". In fact, Vivek Oberoi is extremely irritating and annoying in this movie.

Also, as  I said elsewhere, the movie is ignorance and stupidity packaged in a shiny box with a gold ribbon. Instead of writing a review, I'd rather point you to this nice spoiler-full piece: Kurbaan – Now Serving “Terror Concoction Vomit Curry”.

[sandeep]

yeah I wanted to read this as I saw comments on it from you... it was KJo's attempt at terrorism... that review was hilarious and pretty much sums up all the flaws and loopholes... oh well, back to the emotional drama for you KJo!

[ayaa1977]

I'm tired of all these new half-baked directors that "K-Jo" is putting up on the screen. What a waste. Atleast get them to the mark. It's only giving us more bad movies.

Reading your prediction in October, who knew that cynicism became a safe bet.

[sandeep]

got to give the movie points for one very fine thing though: background score, was very good!

[kaytee]

got to give the movie points for one very fine thing though: background score, was very good!

Totally agree, the technical aspects of the film were brilliant. The make up, the special effects were all upto hollywood standards.

[fizz]

Another trite, wafer thin exploration of an important issue, Kurbaan seems written as a high school assignment by a 13 year old kid who's never read the newspaper and gets all his ideas from Hollywood movies. The revelations of the movie are so preposterous, so conveniently accusatory of every country except India, I wanted to throw up, but kept on watching to see how bad it could get. Good production values do not make a good film. The sets, the technical aspects of the film are slick and polished and all of its visual perfection only calls all the more attention to its stock characters and utterly dog shit script. The films premise, which requires us to believe that a Muslim man without any discernable background whatsoever can just waltz into the life of a Hindu girl, sweep her off her feet (in literally the first 7 minutes), then move to New York, find a job, afford a big ass condo but secretly be cohorts with a four man terrorist organization that has enough arsenal, information and connections at its disposal to stage mock 9/11 attacks throughout NY is just plain incredulous. If that isn't enough to infuriate the viewer, then the film, upto the last minute, tries to portray Saif Ali Khan as some saintly bad guy, who has a sudden realization about how wrong he is and then tries to mend things, while still being a good upstanding, morally conscious husband to tranny faced Kareen Kapoor. All I could think of during the insanely rubbish last act was "Die Motherfucker Die"!

Rating: 1/5

P.S. I could just go on and on and on about how fucking rubbish this film is, but its flaws seem to be universally acknowledged (both here on the forums and everywhere else). Nothing adds up, neither character motivation, nor how entire scenes play out nor its basic setup, the film has no redeeming quality. All prints of this film should be burnt and the ashes fed to the crew.

P.P.S. Note to hack king Karan Johar - next time you need to make a film about American born Indians, hire actors who are American born Indians, not Indians who've only visited America for filming and been trained to twist their tongues to sound yankee. There is such a thing as mannerisms, nuance and body language (that people can notice) and no amount of speaking American English ever convinced me that Diya Mirza and especially Vivek Oberoi (of all people) were first generation American Indians.

[X.]

If Vivek Oberoi can be a first generation American, can I be Polish?

[shariqq]

[ozzylogic]

Brill comic!

[ayaa1977]

I skipped that one because very much every opinion I read banned it. The most positive review of it was from our own Sandeep, and even he was lukewarm about it. I would rather watch the extremely thrilling 2000 film Arlington Road , which tackled a similar subject of terrorist group in suburbia disguised as friendly neighbors.

[fizz]

Arlington Road is primarily about one mans paranoia. That word describes the entire film. It is effective and powerful. Kurbaan has nothing to do with paranoia. It has nothing to do even with terrorism, despite seeming this way on the surface (the film says absolutely nothing new about the subject). It is a vehicle for its two lead "stars", who snuggle in bed together so that tabloid gossip readers can get their fix. I'm not kidding you, that is this films drive.