The Vivaah actress is all set to shed her inhibitions on the big screen and look as sexy and glamorous as a girl of her age should look like. Shortkut is a Anil Kapoor production co-starring Akshaye Khanna and Arshad Warsi and is being directed by Neeraj Vora.

Bringing the transformation in her styling is none other than designer guru, Manish Malhotra. Manish has been giving such kind of makeovers to almost all the heroines of the industry, starting with Urmila Matondkar in Rangeela, Karisma Kapoor on Raja Hindustani to name a few. Likewise, Amrita will flaunt her abs and legs in skimpy clothes for Shortkut.

States Amrita in this regards, “Till now most of my characters in the films that have done have been conservative and that is why I have had to dress the part.

In Vivaah, the character was so traditional that the attire had to support her beliefs. But Shortkut is a different film and I am wearing clothes accordingly. And all I can say that Manish has done a fabulous job and I feel I am looking great.”

Shortkut was earlier scheduled for a March release but the Indian Premiere League’s earlier schedule postponed it ahead. The film now may release in end of May.

After having won everyone’s hearts alike with her superlative performance in Murder, Mallika went onto become one of Bollywood’s most prized and desirable possession, a tag that she carries with her till today, with elan!

She took full advantage of the international attention she got after the small role in Jackie Chan’s ‘The Myth’. She tried to change her image with ‘Pyar Ke Side Effects’ and succeeded to an extent. But that was it.

Two of her more recent movies ‘Ugly aur Pagli’ and ‘Maan Gaye Mughal-e-Azam’ failed badly. But she’s not ready to give up yet.

Actresses she considers competition like Ash are still going strong. Plus there’s the rise of upstarts like Freida Pinto who came out of no where and getting loads of attention and money, thanks to ‘Slumdog Millionaire’. We can sense Madame M fuming with jealousy.

But for those who feel that Mallika has done the great vanishing trick after her last release Welcome, here’s some news that will actually act as some fragrance!

Well, the news is that the international brand ‘Playboy’ (not the magazine, but the perfume) has been rumored to have roped in Madame Mallika for its launch in India, which should happen anytime mid-April.

Although it’s not clear as to whether she will be endorsing the brand or be merely inaugurating the launch party, one thing is for sure, that not just the ‘Playboy’ perfume will be a huge sellout, but also will garner lots of bunny points for itself. What say, Mallika!

By Taran Adarsh

Rating: **

An interesting thought may not necessarily translate into an interesting screenplay. Aa Dekhen Zara is a prime example of this statement.

Think about it… A man inherits his grandfather’s camera and with the camera comes the ability to see the future. What an idea, Sirji… But Aa Dekhen Zara is akin to a bottle of soda, which starts off with a lot of energy, but the fizz settles down faster than expected.

Aa Dekhen Zara had great potential to be a riveting thriller, but halfway through the film, you realize that the writers have run out of ideas. In fact, by the time the film reaches the finale, the viewer is terribly confused [like the writers of this film]. This is one jigsaw puzzle that remains unsolved even after its culmination.

In a nutshell, Aa Dekhen Zara promises the moon, but what you eventually get in return is merely a mirage.

Ray [Neil Nitin Mukesh], a struggling photographer, has nothing going for him… until he inherits a very special camera from his grandfather which changes his life in a way that he could not have imagined in his wildest dreams.

The power of the camera changes Ray’s destiny overnight. His life becomes one big roller coaster ride that takes him from rags to riches and also helps him meet the love of his life, Simi [Bipasha Basu], who is a DJ with a mind of her own. Everything is hunky dory.

As they say with great power comes great responsibility and in Ray’s case, also great danger. He must now face up to the dark side of reality and win not only against the evil forces, but also against fate.

Come to think of it, your imagination can run wild with a premise like the one in Aa Dekhen Zara. But the film runs out of fuel midway.

Director Jehangir Surti has an eye for visuals, but he ought to know that the viewer wants to listen to a good story, told in the most simplistic manner. You ought to be extra careful if you’re attempting a suspense thriller. You need to disentangle the knots in such a way that the mystery doesn’t remain a mystery in the end. In this case, it still remains a mystery.

15 minutes into the film and you’re drawn into Neil’s world. You are exhilarated every time he wins a lottery or race. The introduction of the negative force [Rahul Dev] is smartly handled as well. But the plot slackens thereafter.

Let’s get specific, the second hour is a problem. The screenplay should’ve packed some great moments, but the writers seem to take an easy way out. Sample this.

While on the run, Neil and Bipasha suddenly break into a dance in a tacky pub. Prior to that they jump from the roof of the hotel and land straight into the pool. The cat and mouse game gets more and more confusing with the finale only adding to the chaos.

Jehangir Surti can’t do much since he’s saddled with a poor script. Music is the sole saving grace. The songs are youthful and energetic, one of the reasons why Aa Dekhen Zara has generated tremendous interest. Cinematography is good. The chase and stunts are well canned.

Neil Nitin Mukesh showed great promise in his debut film and you only expect him to climb the ladder in his next release. Sadly, the screenplay doesn’t give him that opportunity. Bipasha Basu is alright. She looks great though.

Rahul Dev is perfect for the part. Biswajeet [Neil's grandfather] has a tiny role. Sophie Chaudhary adds to the glamour quotient. She doesn’t get much scope, frankly. Bobby Vats is okay.

On the whole, Aa Dekhen Zara had the potential to be an exciting fare, but the post-interval portions prove a deterrent. The fantastic promotion coupled with the popular musical score will ensure ample footfalls in the opening weekend, but the film lacks the stamina to run steadily.

Starring: Bobby Deol, Nana Patekar, Shriya Saran, Priti Bhutani, Kulbhushan Kharbanda, Raghuvir Yadav, Pradeep Kharab and Zarina Wahab
Director: Sangeeth Sivan
Rating: **

Nandu (Bobby) and Shekhar (Pradeep Kharab) are childhood pals who have taken to crime and contract killing at a very young age. They get mentored by a goon Sawtya (Jackie Shroff) during their growing up years.

Now as grown ups, Nandu becomes the most dreaded assassin in town and Shekhar his accomplice who always helps him in getting away from the scene of crime within minutes. Opposition leader Anna Mhatre (Sachin Khedekar) to create a sympathy wave for himself in the forthcoming Vidhan Sabha elections hires Nandu to make a false attack on him.

According to the plan, Nandu aims a shot on Anna’s arms who is addressing a huge political rally but before he shoots, a bullets zips through Anna’s forehead killing him instantly. Now the Police present on the scene see Bobby fleeing and think of him as the assassinator.

When he tries to reach for Shekhar’s car, he sees it getting blown up after it hits a petrol tanker. Chased by cops Nandu enters a train heading towards Punjab. In the train Nandu meets Puran (Akshay Kapoor) who is going back home to Hoshiyaarpur after 18 years since the time he had runaway as a kid.

The talkative Puran narrates in short time everything about his home and shows Nandu his souvenirs from home. Just then Police arrives and in the commotion that ensues mistakenly shoot Puran. Nandu yet again succeeds in fleeing the scene. He heads straight to Puran’s house but is mistaken as Puran by his family.

Unable to reveal the sad truth, Nandu starts staying in their house impersonating Puran. There he encounters Puran’s childhood love Preet (Shriya). He takes it upon himself to solve all the problems that Puran’s family is facing.

But his happiness is short-lived as a quirky but intelligent CBI officer Nandkumar Rane (Nana) hot on trail to nab Anna Mhatre’s assassin lands up in Hoshiyaarpur at Puran’s doorsteps. What follows next forms the rest of the film wherein many secrets get revealed some shocking, some not so shocking

Remake of Telugu super hit Athadu starring Mahesh Babu, Ek- The Power of One mixes the plot of many films together.

The basic plot of the hero responsible for an innocent man’s death going to his family’s house and staying with them without them knowing about his true identity was first explored in Rajesh Khanna starrer Dushman followed by Akshay – Saif starrer Keemat.

Then again, the whole political assassination drama and even the suspense angle of it is ditto similar to Salman Khan – Sushmita Sen starrer Tumko Na Bhool Paayenge. Nana Patekar’s ‘chaaloo’ cop who knows his line of duty is a little naughtier version of Om Puri’s cop character in Rajiv Rai’s Gupt which also incidentally had Bobby being chased for murder.

But the mixed khichdi of a plot works to an extent here. But its more thanks to the technical finesse and twists and turns plotted at regular intervals, superbly shot action scenes and of course Nana Patekar.

But where the film falls down is in the pacing that drops down when Bobby arrives to Puran’s house. The whole joint family thing with all the irritating characters thrown in simply grates on your nerves after initial few minutes.

Too much time is wasted on unnecessary and predictable sub-plots. The film could have well done without 30 minutes that are wasted on all this and it could have ended up as being a nice taut thriller.

Bobby acts well and has efficiently performed his own daring stunts. Shriya Saran doesn’t have much to do but look pretty and make faces at Bobby. Kulbhushan Kharbanda who was a delight to watch in last week’s Aloo Chaat is saddled with the typical Punjabi grandfather’s role.

Zarina Wahab seen after a long time hardly gets any scope. Jaspal Bhatti and Sanjay Mishra both irritate you to death. Priti Bhutani playing Puran’s sister act well and looks good too. Jackie in a small role impresses but Chunkey Pandey gets on your nerves in his special appearance with his fake Punjabi accent.

Raghuvir Yadav as the wily politician is good as usual. The biggest star of the film however is Nana Patekar. The openly flirtatious cop with his crazy one-liners justifying his womanizing is extremely hilarious. In fact you keep waiting for him to arrive whenever his character goes off screen.

The film is aimed at the masses but could have been a better one had some loose end taken care of and the narrative kept tight. But it is not a bad film and may work well for you if you literally have nothing else to do and go in without any expectations.

Katrina Kaif was initially being considered for this project but the King Khan made a conscious decision of keeping away professionally from anything that’s related to Salman, Katrina’s name was dropped.

“But then there was also a problem having Asin in the film.” sources further reveal. “The Yash Raj project was to go on floors during 2009 but Asin was committed to do a Priyadarshan project co-starring Akshay Kumar.

In fact Akki himself had suggested her name and she had landed in a catch 22 situation as rejecting the Yash Raj project would mean taking on the biggest production house’s ire and refusing Akki’s film would mean hurting him.

Since, Akki herself had suggested her name, Asin was not able to back out of it. But then luck favoured the Southern beauty as recently Akshay announced his inability to shoot the Priyadarshan project in 2009 and allotted dates of March 2010.

Now her dates for 2009 end got free and she intimated Yash Raj about it. Now the buzz doing the rounds of industry circles is, Asin may be replaced from the Priyadarshan project with Katrina Kaif. Now that would make it a full circle if it happens so!”

By Subhash K Jha

Starring Preity Zinta, Vansh Bhardwaj
Written & Directed by Deepa Mehta
Rating: ****

When the first slap comes, it hits us the audience hard across the face.

Spousal abuse as a theme is not new to cinema. What sets Deepa Mehta’s Heaven On Earth apart from other films on the theme including Jagmohan Mundhra’s Provoked is the fusion of unspoken unexpressed terror with mythological elements all packed with sardine-like compactness into a small apartment in Ontario where Chand newly-packed into a flight that takes her to her wedding in Canada, arrives fearful and hopeful.

What she brings with her is her mother’s tales and homilies, songs and mythology that follow the bride into her chamber of horrors.

What follows in Chand’s new life is a Kafkaesque nightmare that could claim the life of any Indian bride transported into a foreign country after marriage.

Absolute authenticity is the hallmark of Deepa Mehta’s vision. Her permanent cinematographer Giles Nuttgens enters Chand’s adopted Canadian home with her and remains by her side, living her pain, experiencing her humiliation and agony, as within no time Chand becomes that nightmarish entity whom we all read about in crime sections of the papers.

The abused wife.

The film’s greatest triumph is its economy of expression. The tightly-wound tale of the tormented wife is never allowed to have loose moments.

Ironically outwardly we see a warm home filled with a Sikh family half of whom seem to have absolutely nothing to do.Within their abject nullity lies the secret to the violence that claims possesses and tries to smother Chand’s domestic dreams.

We know from the start that she’ll escape the nightmare of a brutal marriage. That she lives to tell her tale is self- evident.

The magic of her existence in the trap of an arranged marriage lies in the illusion of normalcy and compassion that she creates within the ambience of abject terror by inventing a double for her husband…a doppelganger, a spirit in human form, if you will, who applies balm to all of Chand’s wounds and gives her the courage to survive when the very breath of her existence is being choked out.

The snake-god from Chand’s backyard in human form assuming the physical traits of her violent husband is a metaphor that illuminates the darkest recesses of Chand’s godforsaken life.

Every time she hides in her bedroom for a dialogue with her phantom-soul mate, Preity Zinta’s face lights up with thousands of unexpressed yearnings trapped in a heart that aches for release. Zinta lights up the darkest corners of her tortured and frightened character’s heart.

Thoroughly deglamorized and devastated by destiny’s cruel blows, Preity plays Chand with a dignity and depth that take us by surprise. She and director Deepa Mehta keep the hysteria completely in check. The drama is generated completely from the normal domesticated sounds and sights.

The film creates the growing claustrophobia of Chand’s marital domesticity with acute austerity. The spurts of on- screen violence are all the more shocking for the way they erupt within the workaday milieu.

The one big sequence of violence erupts in the kitchen when Chand’s somewhat confused and altogether out-of- control husband Rocky thrashes his wife….for his outwardly-stoic mother’s sake, of course.

There are no villains in Heaven On Earth—not even the husband Rocky (played with understanding by newcomer Vansh Bhardwaj) who hits out at wounds that are never allowed to heal.

There are only victims in Deepa’s scheme of presentation. Silently-screaming puppets on a string being manoeuvred into a life of domesticated dereliction by forces that we could designate as fate or just cruel blows of workaday drudgery.

The mythic intervention that creeps into the plot with the appearance of the naag in Chand’s backyard, slithers into the scenario with surreptitious grace, creating for the theme a residue of myth and dream that nourishes the wife’s bereft kingdom.

The borderline between illusion and reality, between Chand’s violent reality and the world of harmony and love she creates in the womb of her heart, is so superbly seamless we never know when Chand’s smothered scream transforms into a silent whoop of triumph.

Heaven On Earth is not a film that offers easily digestible solutions to the complex problem of domestic violence. It neither takes sides nor allows the bride to turn into a pitiable victim.

Preity Zinta standing supremely dignified at the centre of the conflict firnishes the theme with amazing grace. She’s the only known face in the crowded Punjabi home of patriarchs, matriarchs, victims and perpetrators of bitter violence. But Preity never lets it known she’s a star.

She merges into the terrifying domesticity of Deepa’s household. The character steps out occasionally into the workaday world of a migrant job (the friendship with the feisty Jamaican woman at her workplace rings a little hollow when compared with the reality that envelopes the rest of the plot) and returns to her horrific home space where she creates a mythical merger between illusion and reality.

Finally when Chand says goodbye to a life of married trauma we see on Preity’s face a mixture of distant triumph and immediate selfrealization.

Chand has finally come home.

It’s worse for ‘once upon a time queen of hearts’ Rani Mukerji who made the major mistake of confining herself to the ‘Yash Raj camp’and has hardly any good role to talk about. Except of course about her dear Adi’s films!

She’s losing endorsements to younger actresses left, right and centre and so is Preity.

Their loss has turned out to be somebody else’s gain.

After the success of ‘Jaane Tu …Ya Jaane Na’ Genelia D’ Souza has found her feet back in Bollywood.

Genelia had moved to South when she failed to make a mark in Bollywood with her first film ‘Tujhe Meri Kasam’ with rumoured boyfriend Riteish Deshmukh. ‘Masti’ did nothing for her either.

But now things have changed. Apart from big offers, movies with John Abraham and good filmmakers, she has become a hot favorite in the ad world as well.

The cute and petite ‘Aditi’ has ad makers fighting it out for her. She’s endorsing products that our ‘A-league’ Bollywood actresses once used to endorse. This includes Rani and Preity.

Genelia is now the face of brands like Vatika hair oil and Fair and Lovely. After replacing Rani in the Fanta commercial, Genelia has now replaced Bollywood’s bubbly Zinta in the Cadbury Perk commercial.

Genie baby is clearly a young face and is great in-demand. Rani and Preity and the ilk have a lot to worry about.