Since a long time I have been denouncing YRF products and Dharma products as mediocre. Okay alright spare me an occasional Dhoom.

The two production houses have just turned into factory lines churning 5 to 6 films per year; with new upcoming crew (direction, acting, ...) to limit costs and an eye on 20%-30% ROI based on footfalls of college crowd. They don't give a damn for content, story, music, cinematic glory, ... if music or film becomes a success beyond the expected margin then it's a bonus for them. And to keep college crowd engaged to meet their 20% ROI target they throw in kisses, some patty items, couple of cuss words. And above all ensure that when around 2 hours of story time is up then suddenly all things and issue get sorted out with suddenly everybody getting candy sweet to accept whatever they had been opposing all throughout.

And once evrry 3 years these production houses produce a high budget film just to keep their brand value alive.

As long as there are enough suckrrs around to economically guarantee the annual ROI these production houses will continue to dole out mediocre dishes.

PS: I believe Parineeti has the charm and skills to be a future number 1 Hindi film actress.

Party and not *patty*. Sorry for the few typing errors.

"this is true for even Salman Khan's movies... no logic.. no story... total copy n idiotic movies... still make 200cr... WTF " ~ try visiting Ajmer,Meerut or Jamshedpur and telling that to one of his fans! I'd love to see his/her response.

@Fan : Still more purposeful than the Anurag Kashyap's and Vishal Bharadwaj's of the world whose movies cater to absolutely no one and have an ROI of -100% on a consistent basis. In fact YRF's smaller films like Band Baaja Baraat,Shudh Desi Romance and Ishaqzaade have been far more bearable than their SRK starrers like Veer Zaara,JTHJ and RNBDJ with Chak De India being an exception.

ANUJ - i dont know about west and the south part of india.....But i know that the north part of India is big fan of Salmaan,,,,but i better know that east part of India which includes JAMSHEDPUR being very close to my home town is not so crazy about Salmaan Khan....Neither Jharkhand or West Bengal or any other east Indian state have much fans of SALMAAN khan......Only Bihar is the state in east having Salmaan khan fans........Most of the salmaan khan film do there business from DELHI NCR+OTHER NORTH INDIA REGION and also from MAHARASTRA......

@Anuj: Anurag Kashyap, Vishal B etc. films at least are made by people who personally believe strongly that they are making meaningful cinema. That is not the case with YRF and Dharma. They have no pretensions, no self obsessed beliefs. They just make mediocre even worthless products as long as the cost and timing is well controlled - and ensure that their targets are achieved. There is absolutely no cinematic value in most of their films - you really wonder why the film was made. And their dramatic contents and confrontations fizzle out at the better end of 2 hours because they have to wind up the film. So even dramatic films that they try once in a while fizzle out as they never had any strong story or content, and worse they had not even intended to have a strong story or content. As long as their estimated number of people go and watch the film, they recover their investment.

@Anup : Salman films have regularly broken records in Nizam,Delhi/UP,Bihar,Rajasthan,Mumbai and Central India circuits for the last 2 decades (right from his days of MPK). Compared to SRK whose films have mainly been metropolitan/multiplex hits (including DDLJ which was actually an average grosser in C circuits). Even in the multiplexes of metros like Mumbai,Delhi and Bangalore, of late Salman films have outperformed SRK starrers by a distance. Aamir on the other hand has come into the picture only since 2008 (Ghajini). Prior to that, his popularity was nowhere near that of SRK,Salman and even Hrithik. But I would have to agree that since 2008, Aamir has been the undisputed king of bollywood in both the urban and mass centers with Salman being a close second. Factually, they've had their own phases and ups and downs but all 3 of them are legends in their own right and undisputed mega stars of their generation. Hrithik is a generation younger and hopefully would be there in another 8-10 years from now. Akshay and Ajay for all their effort are second rung stars and nowhere near the Khans' and HR in terms of box office performance and audience popularity.

@Siddharth : I have no qualms in calling Anurag and VB as commercial directors but unfortunately, their commercial record is nothing short of disastrous. 7 out of 8 Vishal Bharadwaj directorial ventures have bombed (barring the Above Average Kaminey) and the story is similar with Anurag too (barring the Average Dev D & GOW-1).
Personally, I'd rather watch a Rohit Shetty film for popcorn entertainment and a Rakeysh Mehra/Neeraj Pandey/Ashutosh Gowarikar film for "meaningful entertainment". The best of them of course being Raju Hirani who imo is the greatest director in bollywood history.

The point is, you need not compromise on the entertainment factor in an attempt to make the so-called "meaningful cinema". Content based commercially viable cinema is the best form of entertainment as proved by film-makers like Prakash Mehra,Hrishikesh Mukherjee,Ramesh Sippy,Subhash Ghai (in the past),Yash Chopra,Suraj Barjatya and of late Rakeysh Mehra and of course Raju Hirani. Senseless entertainment of the Manmohan Desai/Rohit Shetty kind too has its own merits but plain boring content based cinema sans any entertainment value of the Mira Nair/Vishal Bharadwaj and Anurag Kashyap kind is neither purposeful nor worth watching except for pleasing a few armchair critics and winning a few awards here and there.

Shiddharth- not denying the fact that Salmaan have given regular hits,,,, but nobody is considering the fact that all big star getting high grossers by just taking advantage of festival season,,,,, when they dont they just gross average according to their investment..... This year's Jai Ho and last to last year's Talaash are the biggest example.....
Many people say that despite being the fact that talaash was by Amir it didn't grossed 100cr.....But it had earned more then 80crs,,,,,And could have easily earned 100cr if have been released in any festival.....
Then there comes movies like GANGS OF WASSYPUR and OMKARA ,,,, which didnt get much earning ,,, but that's not important,,, important is that how many people have liked it......And most of the youth in north circuit including BIHAR, JHARKHAND AND WEST BENGAL have liked it alot.... They watch it again and again and again,,,, Gangs Of Wassypur is almost a cult film now in east indian circuit.... I dont know whether u guys have personal knowlegde about east indian circuit.....But just grossing high income doesnt tell that people have liked the movie or not......Each and every young boy definately have gangs of wassypur in his laptop and dekstop..... Its just the fact they no body have gone to watch it in theater thats why it havnt earn much........
High income depends on many things,,,,release date, no.of screen it had got etc....... If there is a festival season then people will definatly go and watch the movie in theater,,,,which give the movie earning but doent register the fact that whether that person have liked it or not.....Salmaan's recent movies may have grossed high but but they dont have much of repeat value,,,,nobody keep Salmaan's recent movies in his DVD or movie collection in their lappy and dekstop(Wanted,Dabang 1 and now KICK Are the exception).....Rather movies like Wassypur, OMKARA, Even Maqbool are the movies which people remember for years.......

"nobody keep Salmaan's recent movies in his DVD or movie collection in their lappy and dekstop(Wanted,Dabang 1 and now KICK Are the exception).....Rather movies like Wassypur, OMKARA, Even Maqbool are the movies which people remember for years....." ~wonder on what basis do people make such tall claims as if they have gone and interviewed every single person whose watched these films all across the country!

"And most of the youth in north circuit including BIHAR, JHARKHAND AND WEST BENGAL have liked it alot...."~ again, false claims based on no factual evidence! There is no proof of record number of sales of GOW,Omkara DVD's in Bihar and in fact had these films been liked so much by the youth, they would definitely have picked up theatrically in week 2 as well, which they did not. As I've always maintained, a truly LIKED and ADMIRED film will pick up at the box office and TREND well, come what may. QUEEN,KAHAANI,AASHIQUI-2 and OMG are typical examples of films with a small scale release and a low opening trending exceptionally well and performing brilliantly at the BO. Unfortunately GOW and Omkara showed no such growth, even in the Bengal and Bihar circuit. All these claims of "cult status" and torrents downloads are hogwash and air talk without any factual substantiated evidence.

Anuj- Not everything is need to be proved by man to man interview.... Some things are can be judged by seeing thing practically.......
If u dont agree doenst matter to me,,,,....
And yes now a days not many people keep DVD collection,, as torrent is the best option for watching movies..... I dont know what ur exect age is but I dont think u have any knowledge about what are the usual movies that collage students keep in there laptop..... Please research a bit.......
M afraid u haven't said anything about what I have said about the festival season release......May be u havnt got anything to cut my words,,,, or may be u will search something now to say opposite of mine after this comment of mine........
About the movies u mentioned later - QUEEN,KAHAANI,AASHIQUI-2 and OMG ,, I agree that they have shown good trend at box office,,,, infant these movie are also found more on movie collection of youth as compared to Samaan Khan's film.......

@Anup : I was the first one to accept long ago that Salman's Bodyguard,ETT and Dabangg-2 carried just 50% word of mouth, yet such is the popularity of the man that even a 50% acceptance can make a movie an all time grosser. As for college kids, dunno whom you're talking of since among my gang of pals from Delhi,Bangalore and Mumbai hardly anyone has even bothered watching GOW, Omkara,7 Khoon Maaf,Matru Ki bijli etc. Its evident as to who needs to research and come out of his own zone. But yes I can indeed confirm that college blokes of urban metros have indeed idolized the Delhi Belly's,Queens,A Wednesday's,Jaane Tu's,Andaaz Apna Apna's and ZNMD's of this world while school/college and adults much older from smaller towns have run riot when a Dabangg/Rowdy Rathore/Singham-1 has released. Try peeping into laptops,DVD shelves,TRP's and cinema tickets of every household across India and you'd perhaps get a better sense of what i'm saying instead of making laughably frivolous arguments based on your own personal definition of "cult","quality" and "popularity".

Audience acceptance of recent hits based on box office trending :

1. Ghajini - 70% (multiplexes and single screens)
2. Wanted - 70% (single screens alone)
3. Love Aaj Kal - 50% (multiplexes alone)
4. Dabangg - 80% (multiplexes and single screens)
5. Bodyguard - 50% (only among die hard Salman fans from B/C centers)
6. Ready - 70% (single screens only)
7. Singham1 - 80% (cult in Maharashtra,thumbs up elsewhere)
8. Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara - 80% (multiplexes only)
9. Kahaani - 90% (multiplexes only)
10. Ek Tha Tiger/Dabangg 2 - 50% (among Salman fans alone)
11. Talaash - 40% (multiplexes only)
12. Jab Tak Hai Jaan - 50% (SRK fans alone)
13. Agneepath - 60% (Huge in Maharashtra/Goa, Average elsewhere)
14. Dhoom 3 - 60% (Aamir fans and single screens)
15. Chennai Express - 60% (SRK fans and single screens)
16. Krrish 3 - 50% (Hrithik and KMG/Krrish fans only)
17. Queen - 90% (multiplexes alone)
18. Aashiqui 2 - 90% (mainly single screens)
19. Yeh Jawani Hai Deewani - 70% (mainly multiplexes)
20. Rowdy Rathore - 70% (90% in UP/Bihar/Rajasthan)
21. Singham Returns - 50% (Blockbuster in Maharashtra/flop elsewhere)
22. 3 Idiots - 99% (every circuit,every region,every cinema...all time Blockbuster; the Sholay of our times)

Missed out on many more like Holiday,Golmaal 3,Dirty Picture among others.

23. Golmaal 3 - 70% (mainly single screens of North and Mumbai circuit)

24. The Dirty Picture - 70% (single screens and B/C centers across India)

25. Holiday - 60% (mainly single screens of the north/central belt)

Anuj - Why u r including Matru and 7 khoon maaf with Omkara and GOW,,,,formar 2 are bed movies,,,,infact 7 khoon maaf was unwatchable.....Let me clear u Just because i like VB and AK doesnt mean that i like all the movies made by them......
I dont know whether u r able to understand wht i was saying,,,,,why u always keep screaming about Box Office collection,,,,i was saying something else,,,,my basis of the discussion was different....Please read my last comment again.....And yes i m glad that we two live in the DIFFERENT WORLDS......

Anuj - U know i never go from myself to talk bad about masala movies,,,,because i know indian audience like them,,,,and i like them too......M not denying that.......But when someone from his side starts against the non commercial movies or against VB or AK it feels bad....

Direction: 2
Story: 2
Lead Actors: 3
Character Artists: 2.5

Dialogues: 2
Screenplay: 2
Music Director: 1
Lyrics: 0.5

We picked this quite by accident, @Meetu, having tried Vicky Donor - and having hated it! I have to say, it was better than I expected it to be. It kind of reminded me of Preston Sturges's The Lady Eve - two people who love each other continue the con anyway because they can't think of a way out of it.

Aditya Roy Kapoor, who didn't impress me really as the self-destructive drunken rock star in Aashiqui 2, was surprisingly engaging and likable here. Likewise, Parinetti Chopra, who I don't think I've ever seen before, is really good as a self-possessed young woman sick of being rejected because she doesn't come from a "good" (read - very rich) family, and can't dower herself adequately - this despite demanding dowries having been illegal in India for over fifty years! She's really likable, and has one of those faces that looks nice but not too special (nose is too big, mouth is too wide)...until she's attracted to somebody, when it all pulls together in a way that makes her amazingly beautiful. And as you say in your review, Anupam Kher, one of India's busiest actors (and as if India wasn't enough, he's on an American television series, Sense8, as well!), transforms himself completely as an honest, intelligent, beaten-down old widower who agrees to a crazy scheme of his daughter's in order to see her settled. The background of Indian Law being regularly ignored by Indian Custom struck an especially sharp chord with us Americans, where you may have heard we recently had a number of incidents that brought to light just how bigoted and regressive "custom" is over here!

Anyway, we really liked this movie, and would happily recommend it to anyone.

We really didn't like Vicky Donor, which we watched the same night we watched this, @Meetu. That was, as you said, a clear case of "lost in translation" - and one that I find as baffling as you do, since you and most everybody else here clearly loved the movie.

Putting Hasee Toh Phasee in my Netflix queue, Meetu. :)