The farce called Kurbaan

T'was the evening of the 13th of december.. I got back from my office, slightly irritated.. After all, I had no work to do for two days in a row and that was enough to get me all worked up.. Mishra was sitting in a trance-like state, gawking at the monitor of the PC, as though some angel would come from the magical world at the other end of his eyeballs and ask him to marry her (as usual)... I chided that poor soul for not studying and wasting his time on his favourite sites online. He gave me some excruciatingly lame excuse, which I don't even remember now.

Anyway, I shooed him off and then sat down to get a dose of my stress reliever,"FRIENDS". I can't enumerate the times I've been asked to watch something else by my roomies.. They have the permanent WTF?? expression on their faces when I watch about 7 to 8 episodes back to back for the nth time.. Getting back, I watched a couple of episodes. Then I thought I'd watch some serious cinema.. I thought I should see what the movie Kurbaan was all about.. I dared to watch it, against all recommendations from my friends to the contrary.. I never go by reviews.. They are always misleading...

So, now the movie started..The tagline" Some love stories have blood on them" seemed quite intriguing.. The intro to the movie was kinda sinister.. I thought I was in for a good bout of some hard hitting, realistic cinema and some really powerful moments that would shake me to my very core... But boy................... I was mistaken and how!

The first scene shows Kareena( Gawd I hate her....) waiting for a taxi. Saif( who I had loads of respect for, post-Omkara, btw) tries to hit on her. And voila... Within like 7 to 8 minutes, they are making out in the college library... C'mon, I mean a college professor does have aphrodisia, but to behave like a couple of hormone-infested teens is completely inexplicible. The movie continues to ramble along it's pot hole ridden script.. While I'm yet to recover from the imbecilic courtship scenes, the director Rensil D'Silva decides it's time to take the insanity to higher levels.. And after Ehsaan(Saif)"convinces" her father with a few corny dialogues, Avantika Ahuja becomes Avantika Khan!.. Whoa... (Mishra saale kuchh seekh.....)

So there they fly, to "the land of opportunties", and end up in a home in an "Indian neighbourhood". But what does poor Avantika know what's in store for her!.. She finds herself in the middle of a terrorist sleeper cell. The scene where she realises her husband is a part of the group is laughable to say the least. Ehsaan disconnects the cable of the phone when she tries to intimate the cops about it. But our poor dumb Avantika doesn't have a cellphone to call 911... No, wait, she does have it...She realises this only about half an hour later... Meanwhile all the damage is being done on the sidelines..

U almost erupt with joy when u find that the movie's picking up some pace when the group starts plotting a series of blasts.. In the meantime, the poor Nauheed Cyrusi gets killed and thus enter Riyaaz(Vivek Oberoi) and his sweetheart Rehanna(Dia Mirza).. You don't understand the feeling you have for them.. Is it pity coz u know Rehanna's gonna get bombed? Or is it plain frustration from the clowns that litter the screen?? Anyway, our darling Rehanna gets killed and Riyaaz sheds a tear and takes it upon him to venge her death( How very romantic!). The "New York" routine follows where Riyaaz is inducted into the cell by Ehsaan after he sees the "passion for revenge against the goras" in him.

Then comes the most talked-about scene of the movie. Riyaaz informs Avantika that there are going to be blasts in the city and asks her to find out about the precise locations. And then Avantika shows that she can do whatever it takes to get the truth out of her husband. It is here where the movie turns from inane to unbelievably absurd. She mouths some more corny dialogues like "क्यों ना हम एक रात के लिये सब कुछ भूल कर पहले जैसे बन जायें", which are supposed to turn Ehsaan on. They end up being hilarious and outrageously funny... Finally she seduces, a-la Menaka, and gets him into bed. The intimate scene, though tastefully shot , fail to convey the right emotion because of the God-awful acting. When we come to the end of the scene, as expected, Avantika slips out of the bed and goes to Ehsaan's study and very easily finds the blueprint of the plan. Meanwhile, Ehsaan is blissfully sleeping.. When he wakes up, he goes around the house, meets Avantika near the kitchen where she was innocently getting some milk.. Ehsaan believes it and the director expects us to be as dim-witted.

What follows is a series of killings(homicides and suicides), a few blasts here and there, which btw, is supposed to be the climax. You end up feeling cheated.. And there are many reasons for it.. You expect the movie to have an awesome script as it deals with a sensitive subject and comes from the stable of a very good producer. However, ur expectations are ripped to shreds in this area. You expect the actors to live their characters. But they just non-chalantly sleep walk thru their roles as if they were strolling in a park. Saif and Vivek are partly believable.. But Kareena... The lesser said , the better. Good acting doesn't mean showing skin. If they were proportional, Kareena would have hands down been the best actress in B-town today. There are a couple of scenes wherein you think u might feel for her. But then, in the very next scene, she compels u to do a rethink. The scenes where she puts on a horrified expression make ur day as u get a good laugh out of it.. You also feel cheated because the subtle emotions which needed to be portrayed, are given a miss..

However, there r a few positives in this junkyard as well. The concept of not sounding preachy, yet showing the wounded hearts behind the ruthless exteriors of terrorists is laudable.The scene in the classroom where Vivek silences the gori-mem is quite convincing and turns out to be the best scene in the movie. The performances by Om Puri and Kirron Kher definitely are above average. However the best part of the movie is the music by Salim-Suleiman. It has a definite Sufi touch to it and all the tracks stand out as distinctive in their own way. To sum it up, you are not only let down big time, but also your heart aches to see such a good concept being flushed down in front of ur very eyes...