Khiladi, Hasina & Confidence
Sirjee, I haven’t yet finished my chicken makhanwala…why do you want to leave right now?
Betelal, this URGENT! We have to go home and check stuff out on the internet. NOW…Leave that damn chicken and rush home!
What is into you Sirjee…India restaurant rarely serves us chicken which is not 26 or more days old….please let me finish this as this chicken makhawala looks like just a 14 or 15 day old dish and smells so fresh.
Betelal, we will have committed the gravest of sins if we don’t rush now. The reason is the trailer of Ek Khiladi Ek Haseena which was just shown on the television of this restaurant. All this time it did not strike me – but now after watching the trailer there’s a thought knocking inside my head loud and hard – I have to right now confirm if this thought has any truth in it. Ek Khiladi Ek Haseena releases tomorrow and if I don’t confirm my fears before the movie is released we will have lost the battle. All will be lost.
Sirjee…I didn’t notice anything in the trailer…BY THE HOLY GANGES….do you think this movie is a copy? LET’S GO NOW….
(24 minutes later)
Betelal, take me to the previews of Ek Khiladi Ek Haseena …take me to a website where they give a brief of the story.
(26 minutes later)
Sirjee…none found. None of the websites mention or tell us the basic story of the movie. Ek Khiladi Ek Haseena has been made by Suparn Verma, a former Rediff.com journalist. Even though he has made crappy movies so far, I vouch for his integrity in originality. You must be hallucinating that this movie is a copy.
Betelal…If this was Punjab, I would have cut your head off for accusing Sirjee of hallucination. Sirjee only hallucinates in the company of Old Monk, Bhang and Desi Daru served in Milk packets along with a pure unintentional journey to our local bookstall for the latest edition of Playboy. So shut your mouth and take me to all trailers of Ek Khiladi Ek Haseena, that you can find on the internet.
Forgive me Sirjee…It is not me, but the stupid Kingfisher (that I drank) talking and hence those stupid words of mine. Forgive me Sirjee, Forgive me. Here are the trailers of Ek Khiladi Ek Haseena.
(76 seconds later)
Any thing Sirjee?
Ha Ha Betelal. Suparn Verma and the makers of Ek Khiladi Ek Hasina have been very shrewd and cunning. They only showed the songs in all the trailers and just a second or two scenes here and there. But THEY CAN’T FOOL SIRJEE.
What did you find from those few seconds of trailers Sirjee? Pray Tell me….
Betelal…We still have 22 hours to go before the first show of this movie is played in California. We have saved ourselves. Yes Betelal, I will tell you now of what I have found.
Quickly quickly Sirjee. I can’t wait anymore….Please tell me…
Betelal…Ek Khiladi Ek Hasina is a direct Copy from Hollywood, a James Foley movie called CONFIDENCE
How could you tell Sirjee?
Let me explain Betelal. Five scenes flashed through the 5-6 trailers which clearly point to the original movie. Scene 1: Fardeen Khan, Kay Kay Menon and other characters joining hands together; Scene 2: Fardeen Khan being shown on his knees about to be shot; Scene 3: Feroz Khan saying “I am a copâ€; Scene 4: The gang’s gambling; and Scene 5: Gulshan Grover shown as if he is a big don in those trailers.
I still don’t get it Sirjee….Pray please explain further.
Betelal, it is as clear as a crystal. Here is what the story of Ek Khiladi Ek Hasina MAY turn out to be: Fardeen Khan, Kay kay Menon and the rest of the gang are con men. In one of their heists they will accidentally dupe a guy who belongs to Gulshan Grover’s Gang. The original had Edward Burns and gang accidently duping Dustin Hoffman’s guy.
You mean Dustin Hoffman’s role is now played by Gulshan Grover….BLASEPHEMY!!!!
Shut up and listen. So Gulshan Grover who is a big don and will supposedly own a dance bar (since the original has a strip club but can’t be shown in the desi version), will now order Fardeen Khan to repay his money or else. Fardeen will recover the amount but will be trapped further in Grover-jee’s jaal (net/trap/whatever). The rest of the movie will involve the planning and execution of a heist which Grover-jee will force Fardeen-jee to plan and execute. It’s plain and clear that the heist will be successful and Grover-jee will be behind bars – as Edward Burns did to Dustin Hoffmann in the original.
Sirjee…you are great…But where does Feroz Khan fit into this picture?
Since Feroz Khan says he is a cop, he plays Andy Garcia from the original. Feroz Khan will be tailing Fardeen Khan all through out the movie. Ofcourse in the end, as in the original Feroz and Fardeen, will be shown to be pals who were fooling everyone around them. Ofcourse, all this my SPECULATION and I may be wrong.
Sirjee – where are you charan (feet)? I have no words to describe your greatness. I think you will be 99.999% right Sirjee.
Don’t use anywords. Go back to India Restaurant. Get me some chicken makhanwala, Old Monk and Thums Up from a desi store on your way back.
Right away Sirjee…Amazingly we made it. There’s still 21 hours to go before the movie is released and you Sirjee have graced me with another Bollywood revelation. Can I blog about this latest revelation, Sirjee? It is just my online personal diary who no one sees.
You can Betelal. I don’t worry about your blogs. You are too insignificant to have people visiting your blogsite to read your written revelations. If I, your Sirjee, wrote these blogs, then you would have the world reading it. So without any hesitation go ahead, but never speak a word about this to anyone.
I will not Sirjee. I never speak about your revelations to anyone. But I do hope Suparn Verma-jee does succeed in getting his first hit in this movie. Sirjee..I’m off to get your food and drinks….
And do visit the local bookstall to get me the latest copy of Playboy. With all this investigation Sirjee needs a break and wants some pretty hallucinations.
November 17th, 2005 at 8:49 pm
SHIT!!! (sorry for the cuss words)…but how in the f* do you get these by those few seconds of video???? First old boy, then man on fire and now confidence…you are too good dude!!!! bowing to you! damn - you should be writing for ny times desi movie section or something!!!!
November 17th, 2005 at 8:52 pm
now I’m gonna watch ek hasina ek khiladi to see if sirjee’s speculations are true….u are a movie genius. you said in a post that you watch a minimum 5 movies a week. me thinks it’s typo, it should be 50.
November 17th, 2005 at 8:57 pm
Pleaseeeee give me Sirjee’s address. I too want to become a devoted betelal of Sirjee…watched all the 5 videos on indiafm.com that you linked…there’s hardly 15 seconds of scenes, rest all are songs. and yet you managed to find the connection to the Confidence…amazing. ABSOLUTELY AMAZING!!!!
November 17th, 2005 at 9:17 pm
too good…u r 2 good man
November 18th, 2005 at 5:31 am
@Paresh, anon, future sirjee’s disciple and jiten -
Thanks a lot.
But Nah!!! I may have slightly messed it up this time. According to the reviews just released on rediff - it’s an amalgamation of several movies and the reviewer doesn’t say a thing about the movie’s salute to Confidence…on the other hand the review on Indiafm.com rightaway goes to declare it’s a copy of Confidence and a few other hollywood movies. Watching the movie will now reveal how much did I get it right.
November 18th, 2005 at 7:12 am
Raja Sen at Rediff.com is wrong. He is mistaken to point that EKEH is a copy of Matchstick men. - Just goes to prove that writing for TOI/Rediff/any MSM doesn’t mean you are correct. You are bang on target about EKEH being a copy of Confidence. Mr. Sen hasn’t watched Confidence or is not a genius as Sirjee. What’s surprising is you gave the whole prediction before the movie was released (except for Feroz Khan’s part), while Sen from Rediff went completely off and wrong “after” watching the movie
November 18th, 2005 at 10:21 am
@anon -
Whatever reviews I’ve read about EKEH so far, there are traces of Matchstick men as far as Koena Mitra playing the doctor/psych. But what I’m getting so far is that the story IS basically based on Confidence with some elements(scenes, shots etc.) picked up from many other movies.
November 19th, 2005 at 5:44 am
You are damn right. I in fact did a Google search for EKEH and added Confidence to the search and reached your page. It was bugging me for a while that such a hyped movie is actually a straight copy. I guess what’s worse for the Khans is that HBO is currently overdosing everyone with reruns of Confidence. Well, to the Khans - how shameless can you be… and to those who can’t see the lack of originality - how blind can you be.. That said… Kudos to you for figuring it out.. the promos actually make it very clear.. the key scenes are certainly featured.. and another conclusion.. Indians are far smarter than Bollywood would have us believe
November 19th, 2005 at 10:47 am
ROLF OZ, Again enjoyable blog…not much of a hindi film fan but still enjoy your blogs on them!
You are too insignificant to have people visiting your blogsite to read your written revelations.
Whaaat! To the contrary….seems to me you have lot of people reading your blogs!!!
vi
November 19th, 2005 at 12:41 pm
@logical_tragedy -
Thanks. I think Rediff or any other MSM reviews these days are very very partial if the stars in the movie are close to those in MSM or are an official media partner for that movie. You don’t get a Khalid Mohammad or an Iqbal Masud kind of review anymore and I miss those two guys very much.
Indians are far smarter than Bollywood would have us believe
At present I can think of 3 reasons why cloning is rampant in Bollywood. First - I think the root cause lies in trying to make money in movies the short cut way. You don’t wanna risk your money on an original idea. second - bollywood makers (atleast those who clone) are not sure if original ideas will be as good as a hollywood flick…the easy way is to clone a hit movie to increase the probability of success of the original being repeated in the cloned version. What they don’t get it is that - this trick is bound to fail 9/10 times, since today many end up watching foreign movies before even the makers can. and third - pure laziness along with looking at hollywood as a quality bench mark. Many cloners who are obsessed with the sleek quality in foreign movies - geniunely may be believing that it is impossible to get those kind of stories, original shot executions, visual grandeaur etc. techniques if they and their team sit down in trying to create an “original” movie.
We can talk about this on and on, but if you have grown up on a daily diet of Hollywood movies and are now in Bollywood - you have lost the creative sight to see beyond any successful Hollywood movie. You have lost track of originality and creating something which can offer us movie lovers something original and far better than any foreign movie.
Thanks again for your comments.
November 19th, 2005 at 12:43 pm
@vi -
:-) Thanks for being one of my strongest blog supporters.