Agent Vinod is here to stay

Just got back after watching Agent Vinod. Thought I’d pen  my thoughts before I forget them.

First of all I went to see the movie because I couldn’t resist letting a Saif starrer go by. Secondly, I had heard rave reviews of Johnny Gaddar, directed by Sriram Raghavan which I had missed. This time I was not going to miss a movie of his that could perhaps be another gem.

But then I happened to read the reviews and I almost lost my nerve. Was it that bad?? They have literally written it off.

Now my friends, I have sat through the entire movie and I have survived to write my views about it. Not that it is worth a penny but then hey, with all these people writing such negative stuff, I thought perhaps a person who thinks like me would probably lose his/her nerve to watch the movie. So fret not folks, I am here to set right some undeserved criticism.

I kinda liked the movie. Yeah...so shoot me.

Things I liked:

• The retro feel of the credits – lollipop pink, jazzy yellows, lipstick red…you’ve got it all. Winking at you, tempting you to shake a leg, retro style. Not to mention the Rasputin song from Boney M, to give you that huge push in the right direction.
• The amazing background score. Real good. I thought it was very clever of the director to have distracted us with the score because frankly speaking Indians and Bond-ish action movies just don’t gel. Truth be spoken, except for one ‘perfectly’ choreographed fight scene, I didn’t find anything amiss with most of the fight scenes. But I don’t know if I’d have been so charitable if there was just silence interspersed with the sound of gun fire. So yeah, brownie points for good music.
• That brings me to the other music - the songs. I must confess when I saw the mujra (dil mera muft ka) on TV, I was wondering what in the world was Kareena thinking, wearing that cotton candy monstrosity that is (shudder) soon going to be a trend setter (if TOI was to be believed). So much so that I thought the song was bad too. But, when I saw it on the screen it was bearable. Maybe those repeated telecasts made me immune to it. I liked the slow song too. I don’t remember it though. Even though I checked Wikipedia and think it could be Raabta. The Pungi song is totally Saif’s. His mannerisms somehow humorous but never comical. That guy has class man.
• Okayyy…I know I can’t put it off much longer. Perhaps the most critiqued among the different aspects of the movie was the story line. That there were too many villains, that you get to travel much of the world in those two hours without having to buy any ticket…except of course for the movie ticket…duuuuh? The story is more convoluted than our small intestine. The story begs you to leave your brains behind. And that the ending is a damp squid. Really, it’s not that bad. How is it that we accept such stuff when it is dished out in Hollywood but find it so hard to believe when it is done by our people? I guess we should reconcile ourselves to the fact that India has funds now and our secret service mumbo jumbo is slowly coming out in the open. One has to only remember the tastefully done ‘A Wednesday’ and their use of the media and the police forces’ in a convincing manner, to understand how a good director could use the Indian system to his benefit. Ah…like the use of sex in some of our movies these days. There are a few movies which have shown it in a tasteful manner even though most are happy being hypocritical about it and push it to the lyrics of a song or behind closed doors. Well, I am digressing but I guess you get my idea. Agent Vinod’s story line is merely predictable but it not pathetic and I have seen worse. Like Ra.one for example. (shudder).
• Now comes my favorite part. If this movie is indeed going to be a part of a franchise then there could be no better actor to play the part of Agent Vinod, than Saif Ali Khan himself. That man rocks. He looks svelte, charming, rugged, is a good clothes hanger and what more, he can do the stunt scenes without making us cringe. I dunno why there has been no word about the role being so right for Kareena. I find it hard to see our Bollywood heroines in action flicks. They are just too dainty to kick some ass. Like Aishwarya in the Pink Panther movie. Gosh, painful. Anyway, here Iram alias Ruby whatever is forced to become an agent and is shown being more of an adversary than a gun touting femme fatale. Whew thank god for that. So more often than not, she plays the damsel in distress. The other actors, Prem Chopra – not bad, Shahbaz Khan – stately, consistent; Ram Kapoor – quite authentic; Rajat Kapoor – blink and you miss him; Gulshan Grover – blink, miss; Adil Hussain – good and Zakir Hussain as another RAW agent – is good as usual. The rest of the ensemble not bad at all. Except for the poor acting by Russian extras, others do not jar the narrative.
• The direction my friends. It is smooth mostly, especially in the action scenes. Relatively better executed than most other movies. And uses some clever gimmicks to take our mind off the meaninglessness of some scenes. Of course there were a few ‘unbelievable’ scenes, but there were also some good ones. Like the car chase and the bike chase. Yeah yeah not yet the Hollywood type but definitely getting there.

What I didn’t like:

• The number of villains. Gulshan Grover’s role…why?? Probably concentrating on one baddie would’ve even decreased the un-necessary travel all over the world. It does leave one in a tizzy. But hey the good news is that I’m a viewer. Not a reviewer. I don’t have to remember the story to blurt out in the pages of the www. So, I sat back and enjoyed the locales. Morocco sure looks beautiful. Perhaps our next vacation…must ask S.
• Some scenes are just too improbable. Like how Agent Vinod escapes an Afghani prison at the beginning of the movie. The number of chances Shahbaz Khan loses in killing Vinod, is laughable. Gosh the scene where Agent Vinod asks for beer before being killed…I could go on and on. But as I said, the movie is mercifully slick in many places and is light.
• The wannabe Bond-ness of the movie. Kareena’s clothes and shoes for one. Only, it comes minus a Bond girl’s grit and dexterity. If the movie was more Indianised and rooted (it’s too much to hope for it to look like the grounded and clever Mamooty starrer Oru CBI diary kurippu) perhaps one wouldn’t feel the need to compare.
• The nuclear bomb prop. How many more movies are going to be using this as a reason to get people to sit through two and half hours of mindless violence? It’s high time the industry came up with more plausible devices to get agents to run around saving people.
• It was difficult to accept that RAW has such sophisticated agents and infrastructure. Sigh. S and I simply couldn’t but we decided to be a bit more open minded about it. Me, because I like Saif and he because he thought the movie was better made than most others. Perhaps others wouldn’t think so.

Well I could write more. But it’s late in the night and my good intentions are draining out of my tired body. So I shall end here but it is plain to see folks, that there’s more of Agent Vinod to come.