Where is the zing Mr.Kinng?

Off late, the Hindi Cinema is all about making big bucks. Get a star worth crores, a director who’s had a hit or two, location shoot in the exotic foreign locales; go far out to the maximum extent with the publicity. And you’ve got the initial audience. Unless your luck is really as bad as Yashraj’s ‘Tashan’, it’s a winner formula.

The opening disclaimer in ‘Singh is Kinng’ included lines to the effect that, ‘The hen in the hen chase scene is digitally crafted; no cruelty has been imposed on animals for the shoot of that scene’. Uhh…what about the cruelty inflicted upon us the humans who watched this tripe in the name of ‘mass entertainment’?

I understand that all filmmakers don’t want to change the world - they don’t want to make message movies, they probably don’t want to address issues either. I get that. But how can a filmmaker not care about engaging his viewer - how can he not care if his audience is entertained or not? If you’re making what you describe as a comedy, shouldn’t you want the audience to laugh? ‘Singh Is Kinng’ is a film that has little or no regard for its audience. They only care about the fact that you paid your hundred bucks and bought your ticket! I know that people who make films shouldn’t be made to feel guilty about wanting to earn money from them - I agree with that completely. My problem is with people whose only objective for making films is to make money - they could well be in the construction business, they could be manufacturing cigarettes, but they are making movies for a living!

In a recent interview, director Anees Bazmi said ‘My basic aim is that the film is a big hit, people make a lot of money, actors can raise their fees and everybody else gets paid more. Maybe 10 critics will write bad things but the lives of 100 people will change’. I do hope the makers can afford swanky new BMWs from the money this film will invariably make. Someone should get something from this film, because the audience gets nothing! ‘Singh is Kinng’ is a pedestrian film. There isn’t a flash of wit or elegance in it.

None of Akshay Kumar’s commercially successful capers of late, I suspect, are likely to be worshipped in public memory. Yet each, regardless of everything else, has packed in theaters with sustained publicity and quite literally brought in the moolah. The last few I've had the misfortune of sitting through were called Namastey London, Bhool Bhulaiya, Welcome, and all supposed super-hits! Now, ‘Singh is Kinng’ adds to this long list.

The story of ‘Singh is Kinng’ is a taken from the highly successful Jackie Chan starrer ‘Mr. Canton and Lady Rose’ a film through which Jackie Chan paid tribute to the American Director Frank Capra. The thing to admire here is that now a days our sources for films have become more exotic - since we’ve already extensively ripped off Hollywood, we are now cannibalizing other cinemas of the world!