Directed by Shakun Batra

Rating: **

It is the season of love, heart-shaped balloons and diabetes-inducing greeting cards. So when a movie tries to cash in on this circus of affection, you know what you’re in for. But despite being packaged as a V-day extravaganza, this film doesn’t subscribe to every cliché associated with this auspicious day for getting Main and Tu to become Hum. To describe the core of this film without being a spoiler, we can say that all love is friendship but not the other way around. Confused? Here’s a chart.

All friendship is not love

Like every heterosexual love story, this one has a boy and a girl. And since contemporary love stories have to live up to the new world solution (escapist cinema) of ditching the daily drudgery for chikna neighbourhoods, they will be based in Las Vegas. Our boy, Rahul Kapoor (Imran Khan) is a failing architect by profession, closet photographer and full-time domesticated rat,

Hrithik in AgneepathKaran Malhotra's 'Agneepath' is definitely a visual spectacle but do we have an appetite for a three-hour-long revenge saga complete with blood, gore and heightened melodrama any more?

Rajeev Masand in his review commends the acting but rightly points out that it's 'over-indulgent':

Debutant director Karan Malhotra's re-telling of Mukul Anand's 1990 vendetta movie 'Agneepath' is a glossy, well-acted production. Compared to recent 'mass entertainers' that tend to lazily sacrifice story and plot for retro-style action and star appeal, this remake rolls along like a well-oiled machine. And yet, after watching three hours of stabbing, gunfire, blasts, and hand-to-hand fighting, you realize the film is somewhat crippled by its over-indulgent length.

Malhotra's remake might be a tribute to the cult classic but the close-ups and the loud background score is almost reminiscent of RGV's films. Mayank Shekhar in his review says:

The debutant director (Karan Malhotra) is an equally unapologetic

Directed by Karan Malhotra

Rating: **

Directed: Sanjay Leela Bhansali

Rating: *

A song in the film Guzaarish warns you about the film. It goes something like, "Sau gram zindagi hain..." so think twice before wasting some of it watching this film. But if you're not convinced, read on. The film is based on mercy killing (a legal way to allow a terminally suffering patient to end his life painlessly). But endure this film half-way and you want to legalise mercy stabbing and mercy skull-smashing, to end the suffering you'll experience.

Ethan Mascarenhas (Hrithik) is Goa's very own David Blaine, a paraplegic since 14 years following an on-stage injury. He lives in the part of Goa which falls in Eastern Europe, complete with castle, nurse Sofia D'Souza (Aishwarya Rai) who is perpetually dressed as a Spanish witch (wearing blood red lipstick) and several domestic help who look like milkmaids of different shapes and sizes. The film is a playground

Cast: Reetu Jain, Naseeruddin Shah, Kay Kay Menon, Atul Kulkarni, Ravi Kissen, Shweta Bhardwaj, Rajesh Sharma, Zakir Hussain, Manoj Pahwa

Directed by Hriday Shetty

Rating: **

Squeezing in a series of events that take place over a night can make for a deliciously pacey watch. But Bollywood’s interpretation of this format hasn’t always managed the meat of the bat. While ‘Ek Chalis Ki Last Local’ had a crisp screenplay, ‘My Friend Pinto’ was an embarrassing take on Chaplin and ‘Chameli’ seemed pretentiously art house. Neither had the gritty zing of an ‘After Hours’ or the shivering tension of a ‘Rope’ and yet, it is refreshing that this one manages very well to keep you awake and interested if not anxious about the what would follow. Somewhere between overwhelming and underwhelming is a slot that is called unobjectionable and that is just where this one-night comic-thriller fits into.

Bollywood has explored themes like cops breaking bad, baddies trying to start afresh and every other one in

How many tomatoes does it take to fix a light bulb?

Directed by Puja Jatinder Bedi

Rating: Full moon, no stars

‘The past never dies, it kills’ is a promise made on the poster of this film and that for one, is well-fulfilled. Step out of the screen and you will find your brain cells ready to be zipped up like a carcass in a body bag. ‘Ghost’ follows the most reliable format for Indian horror films: Bhoot is evil; God isn’t and if you pray hard enough or atleast pretend to believe in good over evil, God will take the time out to smash evil’s nose. And as a bonus, we not only have chalk-faced spirits cackling around noisily, we also have the almighty himself sashaying in his biblical robe through dark corridors, managing very well in not tripping over.

The film begins with a mythological TV show voiceover, announcing the beginning of time or end of good times or something very prophetic that you won’t be bothered to care about. What you would care about is the following unaesthetic potty sex

PlayersAbbas Mustan, our desi experts on action thrillers are back with their latest offering 'Players'. Do the 'Players' manage to thrill or is it just another show of style over substance?

Kaveree Bamzai calls the film "a genuine copy of a Hollywood film":

Bollywood has realized it can camouflage its lack of stories with lots of thrills, chases, heists making the location exotic and the villains international even if it has to finally buy the remake rights legally. As one character's motto in the movie goes - videshi gadiyan, desi bomb - of the inanimate and animate kind. Even better if they wear slinky gowns and shake their booty. It allows you to laugh and lust in equal measure.

Taran Adarsh in his review points out the flaws in the screenplay:

While a one-page synopsis of the film would evoke euphoric and ecstatic reactions, it's the screenplay, with a running time of almost 2.45 hours [20 reels], that lacks the power to keep you enthralled and enchanted. In short, PLAYERS has style and

A still from 'Players'

Cast: Bobby Deol, Neil Nitin Mukesh, Abhishek Bachchan, Bipasha Basu, Sonam Kapoor, Omi Vaidya, Sikander Kher, Vinod Khanna, Johnny Lever

Directed by Abbas-Mustan

Rating: Game Over

Desi versions of Hollywood thrillers are like ‘first copy’ bootlegs from Thailand. They initially look approximately the same but later the threads begin to wriggle out. So when director duo, Abbas-Mustan took on ‘The Italian Job’, Benny Hill became Neil Nitin Mukesh, everyone double-crossed and obvious lines were exchanged with a grim face. Now, tough guys don’t snigger until they’ve outwitted someone or unless they’re delirious like Mogambo! But our bad boys are, firstly, not all boys and their badness is mostly restricted to the leather jackets rented from MJ’s ‘Bad’ music video. So looking grim is a ritual observed throughout the audience.

Most would vaguely know about the original gold heist comic caper so let’s go straight to the singular flourishes added here. Veteran robber, Victor Dada (Vinod Khanna)