Monday Morning Questions! The Week I See Arjit Singh!

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So excited!  This Friday I get to go to a massive stadium concert with Arjit Singh!  Would be better if it was some handsome actor, but he is pretty much the handsomest of the playback singers, and has an amazing voice, so it’s still pretty good!  Anyway, to make the time past faster while I wait for Friday, ask me questions and distract me!

As always, you can ask me anything.  From the personal (“who is your favorite playback singer?”) to the specific and factual (“when did Indian film start using playback singers?”) to the general discussion type topics (“who is the best playback singer in the history of Indian film?”).

The only rule is that you have to let me answer each question first!  Otherwise it is no fun for me.  But once I have answered, feel free to jump in and join the conversation.

65 thoughts on “Monday Morning Questions! The Week I See Arjit Singh!”

  1. I am posting some videos. Luckily, some of them are with english subtitles. I hope you like it and give a good opinion. Some are mainly for scenres and choreography and stories. Do watch them

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    • Okay, I couldn’t sleep and woke up early, so I had time to knock out 3 more of your videos.

      The first one, maybe I am misinterpreting it, but is he mad at her for breaking up with him? Why doesn’t he just leave her alone?

      The second one is cute, is she actually supposed to be Hispanic? There were some prayer candles and other things in the cafe that looked Hispanic.

      The third one is nice, it’s cool that Punjabi films have so many village scenes, it’s been ages since Hindi film had a straight up village plot.

      On Mon, Apr 10, 2017 at 8:56 AM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:

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      • First one is actually about circumstances. They are mad at circumstances not at each other. Amrinder is actually trying to set things straight. Majority of song is flashback. It is not a movie that I will suggest to anyone. It a bad and illogical movie. I sent mainly because it has english subtitles and shooting was of my city Chandigarh

        Second, Never gave it much thought. I dont know much about hipsanics. This video is a cinderella story. Tell me one thing, someone showed me a trailer of some south Indian movie. Hero of that movie looked a lot like singer and model of this song Kulwinder Billa. Can you tell me who is he?

        Third is not a movie but a music video. I also like authentic village songs. This song givespure authentic feeling. I can vouch for it. I dont think Bollywood ever showed authentic Punjabi village. DDLJ had too big a house to show a proper village. Bollywood always shows big houses, It is not a good portrayol. I have already suggested you Angrej, Ardas for authentic village. Apart from that, Love Punjab, Bambukat are also good. The trailers I sent have 2 movies set in village.

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    • No, I haven’t. It’s another attempt at a Chinese-Indian crossover, right? Interesting how that market keeps being chased. Kung Fu Yoga, and Tubelight coming out within the same year.

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      • I dont know about Crossover and tubelight. I am interested only because of jackie chan dancing in Indian style. This bought him to Kapl Sharma show. First time seeing him in India. He is a favourite of my entire family. This made us watch something together after long long time.
        But i read that it is a bad movie. So I didnt bother spending money on it.

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    • MI6 might be a good film for her, it is a good series for up and coming actresses. They can play part of the team, instead of a co-lead, and get the boost of being part of a major franchise with major stars. Although I understand the heroine of the last MI film really was a co-lead (I still haven’t seen it), but that’s unusual, it’s usually more Tom Cruise, plus a bunch of other actors who are all equally important.

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      • Yes, Last heroine was actually co lead. I wasn’t actually surprised. Tom cruise shared limelight with emily blunt in Edge of Tommorow. Tom cruise is big draw, hence he will get more spotlight

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    • This is trite, but definitely Gadar: Ek Prem Katha. I have a soft spot for Hero: Love Story of a Spy too, but Gadar is the better film.

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      • I am a really big fan of SUnny Deol. I also love gadar but I am not a fan of The hero. It was missing something. May be the natural aggressiveness of Sunny Paaji. I will say border, jeet, tridev, ghatak were better movies. I also liked Right ya wrong. I will say Ghatak is his most underrated movie. I would also put Damini but it is unwatchable if we exclude Sunny paaji’s scences

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    • I think I’ve seen the first one before, but I hadn’t seen the opening. Seems to be a recurring theme, the noble local poorer boy versus the Westernized outsider.

      The next one is nice, and nice that for once the Westernized guy is still decent and has good values on the inside.

      The third one has kind of a downer ending! But it was good of the machine gun goons not to kill his wife as well!

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      • You are not right about first one. It was not about village boy vs westernised boy. It was about Village boy dumped by his girlfriend for a rich guy. Rich guy is friendly and demonised in any way. Entire song is about girl dumping Diljit and how he copes with it. There is a song with similar theme in which a westernised guy gets dumped for a richer guy

        I think that you are getting wrong impression. I dont remember when a westernised guy is demonised. I like songs more about village life. But i dont like western demonisation.

        People in the endings were not goons but policemen. Jassi is a wanted criminal in this video. He runs away leaving his wife behind and become big in crime world. He comes to know about his son and decides to leave all crime world behind. But police intercepts him and kills him

        Did you see rest of videos? It contains trailers with english subtitles

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  9. I have an idea.
    What if, Bollywood producers try to make a R rated He man movie with Hritik Roshan as titular character? Can this movie succeed?

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    • I really don’t think so. Just because R rated films are always a challenge, since you lose the tickets from the family audience. A low-budge Bhatt film can do very well with an R-rating, because it has such a small budget that it can easily make a profit with only a small amount of tickets sold. But a special effects from with Hrithik in the lead would have a huge budget, and would need to sell tickets to the older aunties and the little kids as well as just the young people in order to make money.

      This is why Deadpool was such a gamble in Hollywood, the stars and writers had to offer to do it practically for free before the studio was able to take a risk on it. And then it succeeded by being a massive hit among the non-traditional superhero audience, the 18-35 year old group. I don’t know if the Indian superhero audience would really be able to break out of the usual family area. But then, you never know until you try! The multiplex and non-family audience is growing in India, and those r-rated sex farces were sleeper hits, maybe the audience is ready for an R rated superhero type movie.

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      • You underestimate little kids. Youngsters make most of the movie going audience. What about Logan? Udta Punjab? These movies were success. best movies were made with risk. Who would have thought Sean Connery as James Bond, Rocky, Die hard, Terminator, Star Wars.? Hell, I can look at The Undertaker. An undead zombie character who became the greatest pro wresttling superstar ever.
        I do think that non traditional movie going audience exists. The one who is tired with all rom coms of Bollywood. I am one of them

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      • And i would like to add. You may not need heavy special effects for He Man. He was made in image of Conan. I think a dark He Man movie can be made without heavy budget. It cant be worse than Mohenjodaro.

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  11. Here’s a hypothetical question:

    You meet a stranger that wants to watch a Shahrukh movie and the only thing that stranger knows is that Shahrukh is an actor with a lot of fans. You can give the stranger a set of Shahrukh’s movies only from a specific year to watch. Like all of his movies from 2016 (Fan and Dear Zindagi). The only restriction is that you can’t give her any movies from 1995 🙂 What would you do?

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    • What a fun question! Here I go, over to Shahrukh’s filmography:

      1992: Tempting, since you get to see him right at the beginning. But doesn’t really show his range.

      1993: A strong contender! Maya Memsaab and Darr and Baazigar and King Uncle

      1994: No, plenty of good solid films, but no real outstanding career best performances

      1996: Ditto

      1997: Ditto

      1998: Duplicate and Kuch Kuch and Dil Se! Very tempting

      2000: No, too formulaic

      2001: Ditto

      2002: Beginning to experiment, but nothing really amazing yet

      2003: Only two films, Chalte Chalte and Kal Ho Na Ho, but they are both so good! Maybe

      2004: All high quality, Swades and Main Hoon Na, but not as much range as I would like

      2005: Only Paheli

      2006: Don and KANK, a strong contender, just because of the range he shows

      2007: Chak De, India and Om Shanti Om, another strong contender!

      2008: Rab Ne, only one film

      2009: Billu, only one film

      2010: Only MNIK

      2011: Ra.One and Don 2, and interesting combo

      2012: Jab Tak Hain Jaan

      2013: Chennai Express

      2014: Happy New Year, NO!

      2015: Dilwale, NO!

      2016: Fan and Dear Zindagi, definitely his greatest acting year, and very tempting

      Okay, I think I might want to go with 1993. Maya Memsaab, King Uncle, Baazigar, Darr. Masala leading man in Baazigar, juvenile romantic hero in King Uncle, artsy actor in Maya Memsaab, and brilliant actor in Darr. 1998 has a better collection of films in general, but I don’t know if they work as well for an SRK introduction. Especially if all you know is “actor with fans”, 1993 is a good year to show how he got all those fans.

      Or else 2016. Fan and Dear Zindagi combine to show you his amazing acting abilities, and his amazing sexiness.

      And now that I have listed out all the years, everyone else can feel free to leap in and give their own opinions!

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      • Honestly, I would choose 2004 because you would get Main Hoon Na, Swades, and Veer-Zaara (which you forgot 🙂 ). Though I personally don’t think any of these three movies are Shahrukh’s best, I think they do show a lot of the shades in him as an actor. You’ve got the romance in Veer-Zaara, a fun masala Main Hoon Na, and then a more serious Swades.

        2016 is good but I don’t think Fan would really work that well if one doesn’t know Shahrukh the star who Aryan Khanna is based on.

        I do like your choice of 1993 though, it does show a lot of range. Lets say you were able to choose 1995, would that change your decision or no?

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        • Ooo, 95 is tempting! It’s got DDLJ, and 6 other movies besides. Everything from Karan-Arjun to Trimurti. But I think I might still go with 93. For a “first movies you are watching from SRK” experience. Because 93 does a better job of showing what made him a star, he was really working hard in all of those films to win over the audience, whereas he sleepwalks a little through some of those 1995 films. Probably literally sleepwalks, I don’t even want to think about what kind of sleep schedule he was on to be able to film all of those at once.

          But 95 would definitely be my “only one year to take on a desert island” collection!

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          • Dang! Seven movies in a year is probably the most in his career. I’m sure some of those movies were to be released in 1994, he only had one release in 1994 right?

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          • 2, Anjaam and Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa. He took Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa so seriously, I wonder if he slowed down his filming schedule so he could focus on it? And then had to make up for it by working extra hard the next year?

            Although it also seems like 95 was the year he kicked it up a notch, was getting enough good offers and wasn’t turning any of them down. He had 7 that year, 4 the next, 5 the next, and then 4 again in 98. And then in 99, post KKHH and Aryan, he slowed waaaaaaaay down to only one or 2 films a year.

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          • That probably makes sense. Wasn’t he close to the director of Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa too. The film was probably more special to him.

            Yeah, it makes sense that he slowed down after he had kids. Plus with the stardom he had I’m sure he started to prefer spending more time on a movie and making sure that it came out well compared to signing multiple movies and finishing them quickly.

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          • I think he was close to the director, but also knew it would be a really groundbreaking film, considering he had previously made Jaane Bhi Do Yaara. A good reason to spend extra time preparing for the role and working on the part.

            Darr and DDLJ, which were such important parts for him, my impression is that the shoots were super fast and easy. Because the Chopra’s were so organized, it was only like 6 weeks start to finish.

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          • Yeah, I’m sure he signed a lot of what was offered to him but then some roles/scripts were more special.

            You’re probably right about Darr and DDLJ. Yash Raj Films was still a big production house back then.

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      • I’d reverse the assessment of Baazigar and Darr. (I thought they released a year apart?) I thought he was great in Baazigar, while Darr always felt a bit too “acting school-ish” type of acting to me.

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          • Exactly. I still remember my reaction in his death scene. I thought, “Here’s a guy who killed five people, at least four of whom are completely innocent, but I feel sorry for him! if that isn’t great acting, what is?” (Maybe it was six murders and five innocent; sorry I can no longer remember)

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          • I know it was an awful lot of people! Many more than in Darr and yet, as you say, he is easier to forgive in Baazigar than in Darr.

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        • No, Baazigar and Darr came in the same year though Anjaam came the year after. I agree though; I’ve always liked his performance in Baazigar more than Darr.

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  12. I was talking to my friends yesterday. We talked about the day when we saw worst Bollywood movie ever Ghost. It was horrendous and complete waste of money. Which is the worst Bollywood movie that you have seen

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      • I have seen Bal Brahmchari. I dont think that it is the worst movie ever. It was a really bad movie. But not the worst. There are worse movies like this Ghost, Kis Kis ke Kismat. One of the drawback of not getting better channels. That you have to deal with what you get

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      • I was talking about the movie starring Sean Connery and Ed Harris
        But yes Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson is a fun actor and quite underrated. Only Pro wrestler who became a successful a

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          • It is a highly underrate movie. Sean Connery’s best “Bond movie” since You only live twice. Sean Connery looked like an old bond movie. It is perhaps only good Micheal bay movie. It has one of the best opening with Ed harris. Best part is that you actually sympathise with the villain because he intends no harm to people. Ed Harris was captivating and Sean Connery was complete badass
            Here are few scences from it

            It can be called Sean Connery’s last great movie and second best bond movie of 90s after golden eye

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          • Well, all I have to add to that is that Ed Harris’ father lives in the same retirement community as my Grandpa.

            On Mon, Apr 10, 2017 at 8:54 PM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:

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          • No, but I have met his father. Who looked just like any other very very old friend of my Grandpa’s.

            On Mon, Apr 10, 2017 at 8:57 PM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:

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          • You must see this movie. It is only Die Hard knock that actually worked and wonder that Micheal Bay can create a deep movie. Instead of watching rajkumar and defending stalking

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  14. What are your views on Akshay Kumar winning national award? I was surprised and angry. Rustom was an average movie with average performance. What irked was the shameless use of patriotism and navy to sell this movie. Why didn’t Randeep Hooda win it for sarabjit?

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    • I did a post on it, if you look back in the archives a couple of days. I felt mostly the same way, what I found really unbelievable is that Airlift was a better Akshay Kumar movie, if they had to pick an Akshay performance and a patriotic film from 2016, why not that one?

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      • Sorry, I didnt read that. It was really a bizare decision. In 2016, Patriotism was sold like anything. People tried to lure people to watch movies on Patriotism. Shameless technique used by Manoj kumar. Airloft was a better movie. But i still think that Randeep Hooda deserved it.

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