Halla Bol - An attempt to make a gripping movie - Starring Ajay Devgun, Vidya Balan, and Pankaj Kapur (2008)

RajKumar Santoshi is one of the most famous names in Bollywood, a direction who has been there for decades in the industry and has given a number of incredible hits; however, he also seems to be struggling with the current scene in Bollywood, making far fewer movies than during the 1990's when he was at his peak. He carries a lot of history of previous hits along with him, causing people to see his movie. Right from his association with Ardh Satya in 1982, and then making a mark as a director for movies such as Ghayal, Damini, Ghatak, Andaz Apna Apna, Khakee, he has been hitting hits more often than failures. When you remember a movie such as Damini which was a hard hitting attack on the prevalent system of law and justice, and how the power of the mighty can almost overcome the power of the law, a case such as the Jessica Lal case was made for him to show his power as a director, moving his audience to action.
Halla Bol was a movie released in 2008, directed by Rajkumar Santoshi and starring Ajay Devgun, Vidya Balan and Pankaj Kapur. The movie also showed a number of others stars in small cameos (no doubt leveraging the power of Rajkumar Santoshi based on his long history in Bollywood). So you have a story that seems to be inspired by the Jessica Lal case, but also shows the life of a  film star who reached a high point through not seeing whatever was happening around him, and then saw something so shocking that it finally caused him to find his conscience and speak up about what he saw.




Halla Bol cannot be counted as one of Santoshi's best hits; when you have seen movies such as Ghayal or Damini or Ghatak, you really cannot put Halla Bol in the same league. It is still a good movie, although you wonder about why Vidya Balan took this role; and you come out of the movie with a realization that although Ajay Devgun was the lead star, if there was a role you would remember from the movie, it would be the role played by Pankaj Kapur. The movie is good in parts, especially near the end, but the first half does give a feeling of a slow buildup, and you can see similar speed and slow touches in other parts of the movie as well. The music of the movie was by Sukhwinder Singh, and you really don't see the music as matching the performance of the film, nothing really worth writing about.
From this point, the story of the movie is outlined, so if you don't want to know the story, don't go ahead from here.
The story shows a film star, Ashfaque (played by Ajay Devgun), a rags to riches story. He was a part of a street troupe, being run by Siddhu (Pankaj Kapur). Siddhu is a reformed dacoit, who is looking at his street plays as a way of highlighting important issues that the masses will see, and think about, and hopefully bring about some change (you know how difficult it is for that to really happen). But Ashfaque wants to rise high, and climbs the ladder to become a famous film star, with a new name, Sameer Khan. He is an accomplished actor, and is now settled with a wife Sneha (played by Vidya Balan).
However, to become successful, you do need to do make compromises, and he has made many; he becomes a part of the system, being a manipulator and part of the corrupt world, but one day, he gets a dose of reality when he is a witness of a horrible crime at a party, and that eventually brings him back to his senses. But can he take on the system and the powerful and get justice ?

Kismat Konnection (2008) - Starring Shahid Kapoor, Vidya Balan and Juhi Chawla

Shahid Kapoor had the super-hit film with a pairing with Kareena Kapoor, and the movie ? Jab We Met. Unfortunately, his luck ran out then, and in fact Jab We Met was released when the pair was already done, with Kareena waltzing off with Saif Ali Khan, and Shahid looking for somebody on the rebound. During and after the course of this movie, there were a lot of stories about a relationship with Vidya Balan, but soon after this movie released, the talk went away. In fact, the movie had a strong opening and a great first weekend, but then went weak and was classified as a weak movie at the box office. The songs were okay, the chemistry was okay (although there were a number of comments about his boyish look while she looked like his aunty), and then of course, there was withering criticism of Vidya Balan's wardrobe, something that must have riled her a lot (she talked about this criticism for some time after the release of the movie).
The movie also had a role by Juhi Chawla, trying to play a non-glamorous role, and if the movie had been successful, maybe that role might have been more appreciated. However, it was not to be. The movie was released under the banner of Tips Industries, being produced by Ramesh Taurani, and was directed by the well admired director Aziz Mirza (who of course has a very strong Shahrukh Khan connection). The music was by Pritam, with lyrics by Sayeed Quadri & Shabbir Ahmed). The movie had story by Rahila Mirza.

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The story of how a particular person could be the key to another person's luck sounds like the story that a fortune teller might try to tell you, and so it was in this case. It is particular painful for a person who was at the top in college, and was predicted to do very well. Raj Malhotra (Shahid Kapoor) is an architect, and is still struggling for good work. In addition, he runs into trouble in the form of Priya (Vidya Balan) and they have a tiff (verbal tiff).
Soon after, Raj goes to a gypsy lady Haseena Bano Jaan (played by Juhi Chawla) for help and advice, and she tells him that there is a person whose very presence will bring him luck, and guess what, it will be Priya. If she were there when he was trying to do his business, it will lead to more clients, more business, and success.
Priya is more interested in doing social work, including standing up for the rights of citizens when businesses are trying to push them aside. She wants to prevent the building of a huge commercial project that will push aside a small community center, while for him, the big move is to propose himself as the architect of this huge commercial project. So he lies to her in terms of trying to help her project while putting forward his proposals for the project. And, her presence does seem to help his fortune. He also falls in love with her, but then, things get upturned when she finds out what he is actually trying to do.
However, by this time, he is for the project that she is trying to do, for her cause, and changes his plans to accommodate the community center, but is knocked out of the bidding process, even though she is attracted finally by what he is trying to do. And then help comes from a very unlikely source, such a help that you would start to believe in a concept of God. A movie that can be watched.

Lage Raho Munnabhai - continuation of the Munnabhai series

With the success of Munnabhai MBBS, it was clear that there would be a sequel, it was just waiting for the sequel to come. And so came the sequel in 2006, called Lage Raho Munnabhai (carry on Munnabhai). The movie starred the main set of 2 characters, Munnabhai (Sanjay Dutt) and his sidekick Circuit (Arshad Warsi). The movie showcases the story of a ruffian who becomes infused with Gandhian ideals (under the influence of the spirit of Gandhi), and tries to share the same with others around him, mixed with a Mumbai type way of speaking.
Sanjay Dutt is Munnabhai, a Mumbai don who indulges in the familiar show of force, and employs muscles to get his work done. He is also infatuated with a local radio jockey Janhavi (Vidya Balan) and wants to get to meet her. However, how to get a ruffian to meet a beautiful radio jockey is not easy to visualize, and then he hears of a contest where the first person to answer multiple questions asked by her gets to meet her. The contest is about answering questions on Mahatma Gandhi (Bapu), and this is where the mix with Gandhian ideology starts to happen.



How does a local hood answer questions about Mahatma Gandhi ? Well, he does this by kidnapping a group of professors by force, and then asking them to answer the questions (and of course, if a professor answers the question correctly, he would get a prize). So, Munnabhai gets the answers correctly, and being highly nervous, manages to make it to the radio station to meet his lady love. He presents himself as an expert in Gandhian ideology, and impresses her to the extent that she takes him with her to present a lecture on Gandhian philosophy to a community of senior citizens (after taking a massive crash course in Gandhian ideology). In this time period, Gandhi appears to him and offers to help him, as long as Munnabhai does everything that Gandhi asks him to do.
And so starts the experiment of a underworld don with Gandhi's spirits, in which he comes much closer to Janhavi and even hosts a radio problem along with her where he expounds the logic of Gandhian ideals and offers to solve the problems of people. And it is here that the movie is mesmerizing, bringing forth the ideals of Gandhi's truths in various stories; the story about the guy who loses his father's money in the stock market and is contemplating suicide, and who calls Munnabhai as a lost soul is incredible, heart moving. The solution is typically Gandhian.
The twist in the main plot is of course the builder Lucky Singh (Boman Irani) who wants to get the old people evicted from the house so that he can gift the house to his daughter's future father-in-law Kulbhushan Kharbanda. He employs Munnabhai and Circuit to get this done, and uses a time when Munnabhai has gone with Janhavi and the old folks to Goa, with circuit emptying the house (not knowing that this was something that Munnabhai would not have wanted). When Munnabhai gets back, he is shocked, but Lucky Singh is unwilling to give the house back. And so starts the attempt by Munnabhai to use Gandhian philosophy to force Lucky Singh to give the house back - in the midst of this, Munnabhai is forced to confront the truth and tell Janhavi all about himself and the truth (and of course she leaves him).
However, it is this Gandhigiri that allows Munnabhai to eventually win out and use the power of truth to solve his problems. The movie inspired a large number of people to adopt Gandhian practices to try to solve their problems.

Videos of songs from the movie:

Pal Pal Har Pal (a very beautiful song)



Samjho Ho hi Gaya



Corruption scene mixed with Gandhism (great scene)



Atmaram Birthday Comedy



Bande Mein Tha Dum