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28 March 2024

Bollywood 2014: Movies that failed to impress

Bollywood director Farah Khan's movie 'Happy New Year' starring Shah Rukh Khan, Deepika Padukone, Abhishek Bachchan. (SUPPLIED)

Published
By Sneha May Francis

This wasn’t a particularly great year for Bollywood. We were bombarded with mostly “nonsensical” movies that tested our patience and tortured our senses. The cinematic champions were far too few, making this one of the most depressing years for Hindi cinema.

Selecting the five films that dropped to the bottom ranks was no easy task, considering the competition was pretty intense.

Here are the five films that we had the misfortune of sitting through.



Humshakals

Funnyman Sajid Khan is surely making a habit of this now. This is the second year, his comedy makes it to the bottom. After the disastrous remake of ‘Himmatwala’, Sajid tries to redeem himself with a story about triplets and inane scientific theories. His decision to cast three good-looking men and women, who triple up into various shapes, sizes and hair-dos, in a bid to tickle us falls horribly flat. Saif Ali Khan and Ritiesh Deshmukh were earnest, and flexed their facial muscles in abundance, but their act appeared immature and misplaced.

Emirates24|7 review



Action Jackson

Beefy superheroes, willing to flaunt their chiselled torso without any genuine reason, is turning into a fad in Bollywood. So, in keeping with that trend, dancing hero Prabhudeva slips behind the camera yet again, and this time to let muscleman Ajay Devgn flash his Samurai sword and shed his shirt for warfare of a different kind. He even throws in his “lucky charm” the chirpy Sonakshi Sinha to flutter her eyelashes and romance his Jackson. Only, his gamble doesn’t pay off this time.

Emirates24|7 review


Jai Ho

So, Salman Khan is the man with the Midas touch in Bollywood , but his magic failed to help younger bro’s action drama from doom. Khan senior would’ve hoped to resurrect Sohail’s Bollywood career, after he helped  revive Arbaaz’s career with ‘Dabangg’, but it wasn’t meant to be. What we were left with was a bunch of struggling actor pals of the Khan family, who step in and out of the frame at random. There’s a social message as well, but one that appears a little contrived and inapt for the canvas Sohail sets up. From Monish Bhel to Suniel Shetty, to Mahesh Manjrekar, to Ashmit Patel to Yash Tonk, to Mukul Dev to Sana Khan, to Tulip Joshi to Vikas Bhalla, to Aditya Pancholi to Sharad Kapoor, they all find a part in their pal’s social crusade.

Emirates24|7 review


Happy New Year

This movie slipped in for its sheer “nonsensical” storyline, despite blatantly piggybacking on the dimpled king of Bollywood - Shah Rukh Khan. It worked wonders at the box office, no doubt, but Farah’s opulent canvas didn’t quite charm us. It appeared a tad convoluted and manipulative, and unimaginative. It was a bit of ‘Main Hoon Na’ and ‘Om Shanti Om’, laced with patriotism, abs and numerous song and dances. Abhishek Bachchan, Boman Irani, Sonu Sood, Deepika Padukone and Vivaan Shah added to the mayhem by sharing the spotlight with SRK. It was colourful and peppy, but lacked humour or depth.

Emirates24|7 review


Roar – Tigers of Sunderbans

A bunch of commandoes, who look (and dress) more like gym-buddies, step on a boat and travel through the Sunderbans to help a fried avenge the death of his younger brother. The majestic tigers are involved, and the gang use peculiar warfare to kill the animals. Long forgotten actor Kamal Sadanah returns to Bollywood as a director, and ropes in his pal Abis Rizvi as producer. Together they set out to capture the wilderness, but fail. There’s too much emphasis on their filming techniques that the story and performances are sidelined.

Emirates24|7 review