So much more excited about the Dear Zindagi trailer! Partly because it is just the second one, whereas ADHM is now on, what, the 513th trailer? Remember how excited I was back when there were just a couple ADHM trailers? Yeah, that’s worn off by now.
I’ll get ADHM out of the way first. Another song trailer. More Anushka and Ranbir goofing off and being happy. But here’s my concern. They are reusing the same footage from the other song videos. Which makes me think that they don’t really have full-fledged song sequences for all of these, with like costumes and dance steps and all. Boooo! Booo to montage-y fake songs!
Dear Zindagi! Much more exciting! I think we have confirmation that Alia is in therapy with Shahrukh, and in her regular life is a cameraperson/filmmaker. The dialogue is almost too cutsey for me, but I will withhold judgement until I see it in context.
They also released another poster, which was tweeted by Red Chillies and then Karan Johar moments later. Which I thought “aw, Karan is such a good friend! Tweeting Shahrukh’s poster!” And then I remembered that he is co-producing, so it’s really a poster for his movie. And then I thought “aw, that’s even a better friend! To co-produce!”
dontcallitbollywood 
Do you think SRK is consciously moving into “older” roles? I know this is not a full fledged role here, but still, I find it interesting. OTOH, he has the same mannerisms as he usually does in his “romantic” avatar, and hasn’t really constructed a totally different character, as he did for the husband in Paheli or RNBDJ.
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I hope he is. Before the Happy New Year backslide, that’s what it felt like. Jab Tak and Dilwale both sort of tried to have it both ways, with him being young and romantic in the first half, and then playing his own age in the second half. And Chak De was right there and Rab Ne too. Even Chennai Express acknowledged that he was just too old to play the usual hero.
I have hopes that Raees will be similar, even if it covers several years, at least by the end he should be well into his 40s. But “The Ring” or whatever the Imtiaz film is called looks like another romance, gosh darn it! Unless they are hoping to surprise us with some crazy twist like “It’s supposed to be a romance, but actually Shahrukh is Anushka’s long lost father!”
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I haven’t seen HNY, but in both Paheli & RNBDJ, it felt like SRK (and Adi for the latter film) were too insecure to actually portray a “different” type of character, and had to fall back on the tried and true “Raj” romantic avatar. Whereas I actually found both the other imperfect characters far more interesting, especially in the way SRK was playing them.
But I disagree with you about CE. True, they made a point of *saying* he is 40 — but the entire behavior and personality of SRK’s character was that of a 25 year old, which made this another “trying to have it both ways” for me. I wished that they hadn’t even bothered about the fake “40” statement, but just pretended he was supposed to be 25, one who looks a little worn due to the tribulations he’s faced in his life.
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I agree with you about Paheli! That’s the big flaw of the film for me, and the reason I don’t re-watch it much. The “real” Shahrukh ended up with some depth and interesting character growth, and then they drop him and we never really get a resolution for his character.
In the interviews for Rab Ne, Shahrukh talked about how the initial plan was to kind of deconstruct the “Raj” character, to show how shallow and empty he was, and that the true value was in the Surindar character. Not sure if they actually managed that in the execution, I think they may have gotten a little caught up in all the Raj magic and spent a little too much time with him.
For me, SRK in CE came off like a really sad 40 year old who was trying to act 25. I really hated him for the first hour, because I couldn’t even excuse his behavior with “oh well, he’s just 25”. If that was the intent of the filmmakers, it was really clever, to make the audience go “oh yuch! It’s just kind of gross when an old man pretends to be young”, and make a statement about SRK’s stardom in general, and how it’s kind of gross when he plays young. But again, not sure if it worked completely in the execution.
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ADHM – just saw it. It is sad 😦 – wasn’t quite expecting that. BUT – someone makes a surprise appearance…
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H’mm, I think the “surprise” appearance has been well known for quite some time now, wasn’t it? When you say it’s sad, do you mean it’s a poor effort, or that the story is a tragedy?
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A sad ending. I was expecting it to be more upbeat for the Diwali release but it was good, lots of filmi references to previous KJo and other movies. A few similarities to Rockstar. The surprise appearance was a surprise for me and the rest of the audience, lol.
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Well, it’s a film about “unrequited love”, so a sad ending is more or less expected, I would think.
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I had the same experience with English/Vinglish! They weren’t exactly trying to keep the “surprise” under wraps like with Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, but it wasn’t in the posters or trailers or anything. So if you hadn’t been following the industry news, you could show up unspoiled. There was this huge wave of excitement that went through the theater, and then cheers and applause. It was great!
This is all just making me sad, because I don’t think I’ll be able to see it until tomorrow! I just can’t find a showing of Shivaay that works, besides the one tonight. So Shivaay is going to have to be tonight, and ADHM is just going to have to wait.
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