Kaun: A review (no spoilers)
R. Bharat Rao
enjoyable movie (with small plot holes at the end, but
I'll leave those for another posting -- discussing those would
be mega-spoilers). Note: if you do want to discuss the ending
in a response, please attach a spoiler warning in the text.
KAUN is a tense psychological thriller, sans the usual Hindi
film songs, romances, triangles, inheritance, money, masala.
A young woman is alone at home with her parents away, the
rain is pouring down, her imagination runs feverishly wild
when she hears of a serial killer on the loose, who murders
women alone at home. The tension in the first 20+ minutes builds
palpably ,the background music contributes to this mood,
and then the doorbell rings -- "Kaun?"
URMILA gets to show off her acting skills (and she does
have fine ability) -- not just a nice face, a superb body, with
amazing dance moves, which is what I had her pegged as
before this film. She does an excellent portrayal of a young
woman, scared and alone at home. (She manages to look very
young too, sans makeup -- how old is she anyway?)
At the door is MANOJ BAJPAI ("Satya"), and his actions get
increasingly bizzarre and suspicious, and the tension keeps
building past the intermission. ("Call the cops" you keep
mouthing at the actress, but, of course, in the movie, that
doesn't occur to the heroine.) Director RAM GOPAL VARMA
uses bizzarre camera angles and tight shots very well, and even
though the action is limited to about 3 rooms (90% of the movie
is shot in the hallway of this house), keeps you riveted -- shades
of SLUETH (this film has some obvious similarities, in the very
small number of actors, and in being set largely in one house,
although in "Sleuth" the actors did range outside the house as
well.) The intermission is ill-timed -- the tension reaches its
peak right at that point, and it takes a while to pick up (maybe it
was well-timed?). Unforturnately, about two-thirds of the way,
the tension sags again, but then keeps building tautly to the final
spine-shivering climax...
My only nit with the movie is what happens after the
denounment (when all is revealed) -- the 10 minutes that follow
have some plot holes and speak of a hasty ending -- but that
doesn't take away from the overall enjoyment of this movie.
If suspense thrillers are your cup of tea, you will enjoy "Kaun";
an unusual effort by a successful Hindi film director, that
deserves praise. Rent it and watch alone at home, late at
night, to enjoy this movie to its best potential.
Bharat
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R. Bharat Rao E-mail:bha...@scr.siemens.com
Adaptive Information & Signal Processing, Siemens Corporate Research
US Mail: 755 College Road East, Princeton, NJ 08540
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Mo
buying from indiaplaza.com
No subtitles but the words are slow and half is English and
the rest easy to guess ..
R. Bharat Rao
> Definitely one DVD worth renting from indiaweekly.com or
> buying from indiaplaza.com
> No subtitles but the words are slow and half is English and
> the rest easy to guess ..
Pity -- given the relatively little dialog and "non Masala" nature,
KAUN is a great candidate for subtitles, or best case, even dubbing
into English -- perhaps Urmila could do her own role (her English
seems quite polished in interviews -- dunno about Bajpai). I could
see KAUN attracting a small non-Indian audience, if well marketed...
One other comment, Mo. Please take care to edit your responses, to
delete as much of the original text as possible. For instance, in this
response, there was no need for you to quote my review in its
entirity, when all you are doing is adding a comment in the
front, and you are not commenting on the review. I only point
this out, because I have seen you do this for many of your other
posts as well. In addition to wasting bandwidth, it is also
discourteous, because we then scan through the rest of the post
wondering if you have added any further comments. A simple
>"R. Bharat Rao" <bha...@scr.siemens.com> wrote:
<review of "Kaun" deleted>
would suffice, and make your post much more readable. Just
something for you to think over. Or a one-line comment like
"I too liked this film" (which you did essentially say in your post,
so perhaps that is irrelevant).
Mo
servers so sometimes if a post is very interesting as yours
wars it is put on new newsgroups sci and scp and sometimes
rmim , otherwise I do delete most of the text .
My comments are always on top so people dont have to scroll
to the bottom for those who have read the post ..
R. Bharat Rao
implicit compliment...
Bharat
Mo wrote:
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