RE: Halla Bol - 2008 (11. Januar) - 5

Hier sind mal mehrere Reviews zusammengefaßt mit Bewertung:

http://www.allbollywood.com/v2/bd/stc/mov/h/673.shtml

@BiggestAJDFan!, ich weiß welche Szene du meinst man kann es wirklich schlecht erkennen. Aber ehrlich gesagt, würde es mich wundern, wenn es Ajay sein sollte, das ist keine typische Ajay-Szene und die Kritik von AAG hat ihn sicher vorsichtiger gemacht, was ich sehr traurig finden würde.

Wednesday 9th January 2008 17.30 IST, Mohit Sharma

The digital revolution is continuing in India as Halla Bol releases on more than 700 cinemas. This is the third biggest release in India after Om Shanti Om and Welcome

Halla Bol has released on 350 digital cinemas and 300+ other cinemas. To put this into perspective, Krrish in June 2006 released on 650 cinemas but only 100 were digital cinemas.

Om Shanti Om and Welcome had a digital release of 425 cinemas while Heyy Babyy and Bhool Bhulaiyaa were around 300.

It looks a possibility we may get our first 1000 cinema release this year as more cinemas in small towns go digital. Digital cinemas have a print cost of 3000 rupees while other prints cost around 70,000 rupees, low print costs enable small towns to get an early release and huge first week grosses if the film works like an Om Shanti Om and Welcome.

Many multiplexes and single screens in metroes have also gone digital over the last year due to lower costs. At present India has around 1000 digital screens and number is increasing every month.

Quelle: http://www.boxofficeindia.com/npages.php...id=56&nCat=news

1/12/2008 11:07:42 AM

Halla Bol: Repackaged Melodrama!

Rating: (HMMM) - dieses Rating verstehe ich nicht

Sameer Khan (Ajay Devgan) is a Hindi film superstar - he has no scruples or conscience, he cheats on his wife, slashes the roles of his co-stars… you get the picture. But at one point in his life – Sameer Khan was Ashfaque Ullah Khan, a struggling theatre actor with strong activist leanings. But with fame and success, Sameer lets go completely of his former self. Till one incident makes him take a stand and question everything that he has become.

Halla Bol is a Raj Kumar Santoshi film and it’s clear that in spirit this film resembles his earlier films like Ghayal and Damini. But unfortunately in terms of gripping storytelling, this film is not a patch on those powerful entertainers.

The essential problem with Halla Bol is that it is a 2008 film made with the sensibility of 1990 – yes, those times when films were louder, there was a willing suspension of reality and there was lots of scope for dialogue baazi.

The characters especially the villains of the piece – be it the corrupt politician and the scheming industrialist are such done to death clichés, that you wonder what they are doing in a contemporary film.

The most credible character in the scheme of things to a certain extent would have to be Ajay Devgan’s – the actor is efficient albeit jaded. And you have to wonder what Raj Kumar Santoshi was thinking when he gets his hero to use a politician’s Persian carpet as a loo! We won’t get into the details of that – never mind.

The otherwise brilliant Pankaj Kapur is quite over the top this time round as Sidhu, Sameer’s conscience keeper and theatre guru. And Vidya Balan does what she can in a limited role!

To be fair, there is some sort of comment on media and citizen vigilantism in the film, but it is an over pitched and melodramatic take that gets very tedious.

The E NOW Weekend rating for this one is two stars. Halla Bol is a disappointing film.

(Reviewed by Naomi Datta. For more tune into E NOW Weekend on Saturdays at
10:30 PM & Sundays at 5:30 PM)

Quelle: http://www.timesnow.tv/Newsdtls.aspx?NewsID=5403

Santoshi makes strong social statement with 'Halla Bol'
January 12, By Subhash K Jha

Film: "Halla Bol"
Cast: Ajay Devgan, Pankaj Kapoor, Vidya Balan; Direction: Raj Kumar Santoshi
Rating: *** 1/2

Some filmmakers entertain while others inform. A handful of celluloid visionaries do both. Raj Kumar Santoshi belongs to that rare breed of filmmakers who opens up thought-processes about the state of the nation, without losing the "cinematic" element in his cinema.

"Halla Bol" belongs to the same unique hard-hitting gut-wrenching genre of cinema as Santoshi's "Damini", "Ghaatak" and the under-rated "Lajja". The overall product lacks finesse and parts of the plot (for instance where hero Ajay Devgan, who plays an actor, pees on the villain's Persian rug) come across as laboured.

Sameer Khan (Ajay Devgan) is a superstar. He has the world at his feet, but his life changes when two people kill a girl in front of him in a high-profile Page Three party. One of the killers is the son of a politician and the other a liquor baron.

No one, including Sameer, helps the police nab the culprits. Conscience, however, tugs at Sameer later and he undergoes a metamorphosis. "Halla Bol" reminds one of the famous Jessica Lal murder case in New Delhi - in which model-cum-host Jessica was gunned down in a restaurant in 1999.

The message that masses need to arise from their slumber rings out loud and clear. Brutality is often superimposed on a laidback lyricism in Santoshi's not-so-mellow-dramas. He sees the middle class as a "collectively cowardly mass" waiting to be prodded awake.

Earlier Sunny Deol used to serve these wakeup calls. Now it's Ajay Devgan for Santoshi. In "Halla Bol", the actor gets to grab a glorious graph as he goes from being a committed street-theatre performer to a corrupt screen superstar and finally a socially conscious citizen who stands up for a worthy cause. The script is full of "passionate" rhetoric (articulately written by Santoshi).

The scenes come alive because of the characters' ability to transcend the occasionally trite material and communicate the gripping drama of social awakening through words and expression that suggest a link between pop-art and a socio-political manifesto. Disembodied news clippings from news channels coalesce urgently with the larger picture as Santoshi takes swipes at the establishment.

The swinging fortunes of the small-time actor Ashfaque to Sameer Khan is peppered with arresting interludes from the entertainment business. The buzz and the bitching, the hypocrisy and the promiscuity - they all get a wide margin in the cannily written plot that weaves conscience into a tale with flair.

While Devgan gets seriously explorative once again (playing a character who goes from vain and libidinous to repentant and heroic), it is Pankaj Kapoor who gives a sterling performance as Devgan's conscience-keeper. Supremely confident in his space, Kapoor plays a street-theatre artiste who was once a warrior. It's by far one of the most interesting and multi-layered scripts written for a character actor, and one that gives this underused actor a chance to deliver rabble-rousing rhetoric, without getting pulpit-friendly.

In a plot that favours male actors, Vidya Balan makes silent space for herself. She has just three major sequences. "Halla Bol" towers over the average potboilers because it puts across home truths in a language that tends to get shrill, but never shallow.

The war cry comes in a raging spurt of indignant creativity in "Halla Bol". Effectively scripted and with dialogues that propel the plot to a climax without moving ahead of itself, the narrative conveys the angst it wants to.

On this occasion, Santoshi has a lot to say about the "conscience and the celebrity". He also speaks about the misuse of the minority card by politicians. Though shot with an eye for the personality-defining details by cameraman S. Natarajan Subramaniam, some portions of the tale appear tacky when compared with the enormity of the theme. Maybe, editor Steven Bernard needed to exercise more economy of expression.

"Halla Bol" may not strike you as being the epitome of subtle social reformism. Its tone is more of a street play than a Sunday-evening curio at Prithvi Theatre. But what's truly remarkable about Santoshi's cinema is the multiplicity of ideas and themes on contemporary India that come into play through cinematic devices.

If on one hand, you hear Jackie Shroff discussing Aamir Khan's run-in with the Gujarat government, on the other we have Sayali Bhagat popping in for an item song. The spectrum is vast and baggy. And yes there are strong words against the politics of minorityism and the cult of celebrity bashing.

One may think Raj Kumar Santoshi has bitten more than he can chew. But that's a mistake. This filmmaker can create tensions in the plot without allowing the pressure of balancing the "formula" with the "ideas" to show up in the product.

The product never actually ends. For Santoshi's morally conflicted protagonists, there's always another beginning.

Quelle: http://www.kalingatimes.com/entertainmen...2-halla-bol.htm
http://www.ibosnetwork.com/newsmanager/t...=21098&zoneid=2

Wednesday, January 16, 2008 20:43 IST

Film: Halla Bol
Direction: Rajkumar Santoshi
Cast: Ajay Devgan, Pankaj Kapur, Vidya Balan
Rating: **

Halla Bol has some five outstanding scenes. If only the remaining could stand up to the brilliance of those five scenes, it would have made all the difference. Sadly, the film that comes from one of the most accomplished filmmakers of this generation, fails to make an impact in totality.

The story, in a nutshell, revolves around a small town guy Ashfaque (Ajay Devgan) making it big in the world of the Indian film industry. The superstar, now Sameer Khan, loses his own identity in the process and moves away from everyone close to him including his parents, wife (Vidya Balan) and mentor Sidhu (Pankaj Kapur). A shootout at a filmi do throws his life in a tumultuous set of events, when he decides to testify against the son of a wily politician and his cronies ("We have money, power and public" is their common mantra).

Rajkumar Santoshi made some of the most hard-hitting films in the 90s, the notable ones being Ghayal, Damini, Ghatak and Lajja. They were all impactful films, with hard-hitting issues that dared to raise questions.

In that respect, he is clearly back in familiar territory. A burning issue that affects the common man, the protagonist-with-a cause locking arms with perpetrators more powerful than him, mass appealing dialogues bordering on crass at times, and a finale that's meant to stir the aam junta into delivering justice with the law failing to do so otherwise, all these seem to be the perfect ingredients for a Santoshi flick.

It's been a while since a filmmaker that brought all these elements to screen. As much as it is refreshing to see the return of the 'film with a social agenda' format, the handling of the subject leaves a lot to be desired.

The same very '90s' emotions that appealed once, fails this time round. The cinematography is ordinary, and the sets tacky. Besides, there are too many unanswered questions that make the deficiencies of the half-baked script glaring.

The film raises a number of issues including the role of media in propaganda, the need of superstars in the country to give something back to society, and the lackluster state of the government machinery when it comes to delivering justice. Although the good intentions of the makers are apparent, Halla Bol fails to create the impact which, say, a Rang De Basanti, or even Santoshi's own Damini created.

The main reason for this is a weak protagonist in the form of the film star. Besides, all Devgan manages to do is portray a caricature of a film stars in the industry. On the other hand, the real hero of the film is Sidhu. A character that is well written, Pankaj Kapur performs the role of a dacoit-turned-social reformist with aplomb. In fact, his performance will go down as among his best, which is saying something when you go by the actor's impressive filmography.

Sadly, the movie itself may not be remembered for too long. Although the intent of the makers needs to be lauded, Halla Bol, in the end, is a mediocre attempt at best.

Quelle: http://www.dnaindia.com/report.asp?newsid=1145585

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