DVD Collectors Online

Om Shanti Om, a review by Tom

Title: Om Shanti Om
Year: 2007
Director: Farah Khan
Rating: FSK-12
Length: 162 Min.
Video: Anamorphic Widescreen 2.35
Audio: German: Dolby Digital 5.1, Hindi: Dolby Digital 5.1
Subtitles: German

Stars:
Shah Rukh Khan
Deepika Padukone
Arjun Rampal
Kirron Kher

Plot:
In the 1970s, Om, an aspiring actor, is murdered, but is immediately reincarnated into the present day. He attempts to discover the mystery of his demise and find Shanti, the love of his previous life.

Awards:

Filmfare Awards	2008	Nominated	Best Actor Award	Shah Rukh Khan
Filmfare Awards	2008	Nominated	Best Actress Award	Deepika Padukone
Filmfare Awards	2008	Nominated	Best Director Award	Farah Khan
Filmfare Awards	2008	Won	Best Female Debut Award	Deepika Padukone
Filmfare Awards	2008	Nominated	Best Movie Award
Filmfare Awards	2008	Nominated	Best Music Director Award	Vishal Shekhar
Filmfare Awards	2008	Won	Best Special Effects Award
Filmfare Awards	2008	Nominated	Best Supporting Actor Award	Shreyas Talpade
IIFA Awards	2008	Won	Best Lyricist	Javed Akhtar

Extras:
Scene Access
Commentary

I enjoyed it. At first I was tending to give one rating lower, but the second half was great fun.

This movie has some great Bollywood parodies. When they were doing the Filmfare awards and are showing the best actor's entries, they make a fun parody of the Dhoom film series (Annoucer: "Dhoom 5: Now without Abhishek Bachchan" - Abhishek Bachchan: "WHAT!?"). Shah Rukh Khan's character's two entries have they title based on real Shah Rukh Khan movies.
And as far as I can see, all of Bollywood's A-list makes a cameo in this movie.

Rating:

(From Tom's Random Reviews on June 3rd, 2010)

Rambo, a review by Jon

Rambo ***
3 out of 5

I tend to be cynical about Stallone. Once again he is crapping on earlier movies, insinuating in interviews that Rambo 3 (or even 2) is not what he intended in retrospect. Well, he wrote them, they made the character an icon, and he was always capable of more realism should he have chosen to do so. Strange he manages to do that now when his career was all but over. (see also, Rocky Balboa). He could never have made this, 20 years on, if the sequels hadn't been as dumb fun as they were.

But this is being picky, because right now, we have a pretty good movie in Rambo, that feels more like the first in terms of character, and brings him full circle. It also opens up the debate on screen violence. He was going for realism, but bloody hell this is violent! Rambo for the Hostel generation?

Maybe, but it is only the same realism we've seen in Saving Private Ryan, etc. What is making critics uncomfortable, leading them to call this "offensive", is that Rambo is first and foremost entertainment. Personally, the only problem I have with it is that it may alienate an audience who would otherwise enjoy this outing, but to call it offensive is a serious case of double-standards. Stallone never treats life as a cheap commodity here. He's dialled the character back to the self-loathing monk of First Blood and it emphasises the massive body count as a tragic consequence, not a score-sheet, unlike other action films.

Also, it's easy to be critical, but in choosing Burma he is lifting the lid slightly on an horrendous situation that is relatively unknown. So if the average guy watches this, cheering on the hero has he treats endless enemy soldiers like giant water balloons filled with gore, then makes a connection while watching the news reports about Karen rebels or Aung San Suu Kyi, then that's a worthwhile first step, surely.

Back on the pure entertainment front, I haven't bothered to go on about the plot, because you already know if you have half-a-chance of liking it! Suffice to say, I have nothing against a part 5. Stallone still looks convincing even at 60+! There was an abandoned idea for this outing that could still work, just so long as he doesn't get too successful in the meantime. The successful Sly Stallone can't write for shit.

(From Jon's Random Reviews on July 24th, 2009)

"Due South" marathon, a review by addicted2dvd

North

Definitely a good episode... I enjoyed it. It was fun to see Ray out of his element. One thing that did bug me a little... either the wolf is deaf or he is not deaf. In this episode... if the wolf was deaf how would he come running by Fraser hollering out that they were leaving and were not coming back (beginning of the episode). But I shouldn't be surprised as they are always putting little things in there as if the wolf could hear. just not quite this blatant about it.

My Rating:

(From "Due South" marathon on August 10th, 2009)