From Piku to Dil Dhadakne Do

I ended up watching quite a few movies over the last 2 weeks starting from Piku and then doing Bombay Velvet and Tanu weds Manu returns in one day, and ending with the first day last show of Dil Dhadakne Do yesterday. 4 in 1 post coming up:

Piku

Shhojit Sircar’s latest creation puts Bongs front and centre in the character list with superb performances. It made me feel both conservative due to Piku & her father’s philosophies that did not echo with me, and nostalgic with the ancient family mansion that I could really relate to. Watching it in Kolkata also helped set the atmosphere. Moving on to the tech:

• The first meeting room scene with Lenovo laptops raised some hopes of making the movie less fruity, but that turned out to be the only non-Apple spot
• Wonder why Piku had an ancient iMac at work when she was using a MacBook most of the time…
• iPhones galore in the movie, and I’m pretty certain that Deepika Padukone is an iPhone user given the way she used the volume keys to click a shot on the move
• Also found it interesting that they did away with the front seat head rests in the Innova in the Delhi-Kolkata stretch, only to have them come back on the return trip

Bombay Velvet

Enjoyed the movie more than I expected and it was in some ways a documentary for how Bombay evolved into its current state. Pretty good job by the creators with the retro setting except for the cage fight portions which felt out of place. Also marked Karan Johar’s proper screen debut after his small part in DDLJ.

The “Smoking kills” displayed throughout the movie should’ve probably been replaced with “Smokers kill” given the trigger happy hero. I also suspect a spike in the search for performances of a certain Rosie in Goa after the release of the movie.

Tanu weds Manu returns

Watched this right after Bombay Velvet on the same day, and I ended up enjoying it even more than Piku. If the first part was a surprise hit, then the second was an even bigger surprise. Not much to say here other than appreciate the performances all around.

Dil Dhadakne Do

Watched the 10:30 pm show and enjoyed it as much as the other movies even though it was nearly 2:45 hours long. Pretty enjoyable movie with the typical Zoya-Farhan Akhtar touch of silent moments that speak tons. Not quite in the league to Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara in my books, but the key conflicts are quite relatable though they happen to the rich and famous. However, this movie pretty much showcases how far we’ve come since the days movies focused on Indian poverty, and anyone watching this movie would think that Indians are globe trotting Apple fanboys. And that brings me to the tech:

• Another ancient, but large screen iMac being used by Kabir at home. Guess the rich and famous don’t always live on the edge of tech.
• Ayesha makes a good impression as a budding entrepreneur with her simple encased smartphone, but right after that we are treated to a travel site office that’s almost entirely based on iMacs. A design firm with iMacs I could’ve digested, but this was a bit too much. Then again, I’ve not visited any travel site office.
• Then of course there’s a sort of laptop class barrier on the cruise ship with the really rich separated from the not so rich in the form of MacBooks and PCs.
• Sunny (Farhan Akhtar) choosing to use a mirrorless over a DSLR and the absence of any DSLR in the movie shows how things have changed in just 2-3 years.