New Podcast! We Fight Over Premam

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New podcast!  A short one, because we ran out of things to say.  But hey, Premam!  You have to love hearing what we thought about that, right?  Well, what Dina thought, you already have my two posts (here and here)

Just telling you now, the best part is when Dina thinks about 3 seconds over who is the best actress, but has to spend a full minute mulling over which is the best facial hair.

 

Pretty Soundcloud link!

 

Ugly itunes link:

 

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/dont-call-it-bollywood/id1262714482?mt=2

43 thoughts on “New Podcast! We Fight Over Premam”

  1. I didnt hear it fully since its my favourite film ever and i dont want to hear anything negative about it.
    Check out this facebook post from its director as a response towards the criticIsm from state awards juree
    https://mbasic.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10154219989092625&id=764377624&refid=17&_ft_=top_level_post_id.10154219989092625%3Atl_objid.10154219989092625%3Athid.764377624%3A306061129499414%3A2%3A1451635200%3A1483257599%3A-9141241253933555024&__tn__=%2AW-R

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    • I liked it, Dina was more “BUT NOTHING HAPPENS!!!!” However, this was also my 4th or 5th watch, and it definitely grows on you over time. While Dina was trying to process the whole thing on just one watch. I wouldn’t be surprised if she comes back to it in 6 months and “gets” it.

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        • True! But you know, I think I might stick with the beard being just slightly too much in the middle section. Too aggressive. The mustache is a nice kind of compromise.

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          • But the extra aggression in character design is balanced by the role and the fierceness of Malar don’t you think? If the beard was less aggressive, he’d look a little childish. I loved the second intro too. Black shirt and lungi! Even though they were doing the most childish of things- lighting a firecracker, the sequence immediately after that establishes him as a grown up. Which makes the romance with the teacher seem uncreepy.

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          • Oh yes, I absolutely agree with it from an artistic perspective! He’s supposed to be super manly at that point and so on. I just think I prefer slightly less beard on my Nivin, which swings my personal taste towards the mustache and sideburns era.

            Here’s a real challenge, bearded Nivin in the middle part of Premam versus mustache Nivin in Action Hero Biju?

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          • You’re not allowed to have a full beard in the services unless you’re a Sikh. So it would look as wrong as long hair on army guys. Which is what SRK films get wrong.

            You gotta watch Sakhavu dude!! He nails the look, the walk, the eyes, the bodylanguage!! With every one of his films I feel like “why haven’t I watched this already?”

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          • From the director’s commentary of Main Hoon Na, the only reason Kabir Bedi’s character is a Sikh is because he didn’t want to shave his beard. one of those things that I might try to analyze and come up with a really deep meaning for, and then it turns out to be just because an actor didn’t want to shave.

            Super curious for your reaction to Jacobinte Swarigam. Partly because I kind of think you might hate it? From what I know, it might be the anti-Sakhavu.

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          • It isn’t on hotstar yet so I’d really have to fish out a reliable subtitled version or find subtitles somewhere and find somewhere to get the film from. I definitely want to go through Pauly’s filmography now. I don’t know if the characterization has his personal inputs or if that’s the writer and director getting those nuances right but they’re amazing.

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          • He had a lot of tiny roles to begin with, so watch out on the filmography, a bunch of the early stuff you have to really look for him. Thatthathin Marathu (or something like that) is another good one. Also, he has a cameo in Vikramadithyan and Annemariya Kallipilaanu, which are both okay movies just on their own.

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          • Because I care, I just took a look at what hotstar offers!

            Kammatipaddam, you will absolutely love and possibly become obsessed with. Ennu Ninte Moideen, you will like (not sure about love). Iyobinte Pusthakam you might also like, different actor than you have seen before, but that kind of angry damaged hero you like. Classmates is there too, the plot and acting and all of that is great, but hte style might look a little old-fashioned to you (it distracted me). And then there’s a whole bunch of really great classic films, but I’ll leave those until you ask for them.

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          • I don’t mind, it makes me feel smart to have people constantly ask me things.

            On Sat, Sep 16, 2017 at 11:10 PM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:

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          • 1 and 2 stuck together? So that makes them shorter instead of longer, booo! I want a version of 2 that is 3 and a half hours long.

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          • I know right?! But it would still be nice to see what they put together. I was having BB withdrawal so I started to reread through your index again. Please can we please have a Bahubali: Impressions in retrospect post in honor of the world television premiere of BB2 on October 8??

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          • I am strongly tempted just because world television premieres always drive up my viewership. But I don’t know if I have anything more to say?

            On Sun, Sep 17, 2017 at 9:17 AM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:

            >

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          • Hmm. I’ll think on that. If nothing else, October 8th is int he middle of SRK month, so it might make some nice counter-programming.

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  4. Also, Dina would be very happy with Sakhavu. It totally has a plot!!

    I have to say I cannot, at this point, condone any opinion that paints Nivin Pauly’s beard adversely!! You CANNOT do that!! Nivin Pauly’s beard is my favorite Malayalam actor right now!!! 😂

    About the actual film– I loved how all three of his ladies had the power. I love this non -toxic model. Even with Malar, the attraction isn’t forced from his side. The teacher is attracted to him from the word go and we never go into the morality part. We never ask if the teacher student thing is right or wrong. Because that’s not necessary. She’s a young teacher and he’s a college guy and eventually in a few years they’d get married and that’ll be that.

    Even with Mary, even at 16, the respect and acceptance of her decision is the first thing you notice. And she has a string of suitors hanging by her door. She enjoys the attention too but never in a creepy, power hungry way.

    And I love how even the third love story is also female driven. They already had the Base of friendship from when they hungout with Mary and the guy so this relationship was already meaty when they meet again.

    I so loved that he had a bakery. And it’s a fancy one in a large heritage looking building too. Plus he bakes!

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    • Yes! I love how even handed the romances were. It felt like, we happened to be watching this guys story, but each of the women probably had their own stories and motivations that we just didn’t know about. They weren’t empty vessels for his dreams.

      Even the last one (I am blanking on her name), she was very young but she still wasn’t “perfect”. she had her little crush as a child, and then the mess relationship with him and fiance, she had her own stuff going on.

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      • Totally. Like Mary and her father. And Malar’s life back at home. The kid probably just had a crush and she didn’t think much about what living with the guy would be like. Because that’s how marriages work in India. Guy looks good right now? That’s all you need to take him home and meet the astrologer!

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        • Yes! And it on second/third watches, it also made me happier for the ending of Malar’s story. We never really saw most of her life, just this little snippet at college. But the rest of her life was something her husband knew and could relate to. Maybe Nivin was really important to her and could have grown to be even more important, but he wasn’t everything to her.

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          • She was ready to get married to him. I don’t think that’s underrepresented. But I like that whenever she regained her memory, perhaps she was married already then, she remembered exactly what he was like. She knew him so well. She knew it would hurt him to know she remembered but they couldn’t be together anymore. Maybe the husband had been really good to her and when she regained the memory (the husband was the cousin right? Did I get that right?) she saw how good he had been to her too.

            Nivin Pauly’s character looks and feels rowdy but it’s also very guy next door. When he cries leaving Malar’s house and his friends hold him– that’s not exaggerated at all. When they help him with Mary and the letter- totally natural!!

            The film is about the love between the friends as much as it is about the love between the guy and the girls.

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          • I love the friend group! So supportive and sensitive and loving, while still feeling very “male”, you know?

            It’s Malar’s cousin who she marries, and he was in the car crash with her to begin with. there’s a great classic Malayalam film, Innale, that is essentially Malar’s story. A woman has amnesia and slowly falls in love with one of the people who help her start her life over again. But what happens if her past comes back to her? It’s very lowkey and undramatic, and the guys are not as attractive as the modern guys, but the story is really interesting.

            What I started thinking about on subsequent watches is how Malar’s life would have been post-accident. We see that her cousin is there for her completely, and he’s old enough and independent enough to take care of her. Probably for the best that she had this reliable mature person in her life just then, instead of Nivin who was still in college and all. anyway, it does feel like at the wedding scene, their romance really is in the past. her husband knows everything, and Celeste (ha! I remembered!) knows everything too.

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  5. Also, he has a cameo in Vikramadithyan and Annemariya Kallipilaanu, which are both okay movies just on their own.
    >>> Isn’t it Dulquer who plays a cameo in Annemariya Kallipilaanu?

    Nivin plays a cameo (negative role) in “Da Thadiya”, an Ok kind of a film.

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  6. Nivin’s good or entertaining film which havent been reviewed here:

    Oru Vadakkan Selfie (A Northern Selfie): A Comedy entertainer with little bit of thriller elements. Also starring Aju Varghese and Vineeth Sreenivasan. Personally I Liked it. It was hugely entertaining.

    5 Sundarikal (Five Beautiful Women): An Anthology with 5 stories. Dulquer Salaman and Fahadh Faasil appears in other stories. I Liked 4 out of the 5 stories.

    Njandukalude Nattil Oridavela ( An Interval In the Land of Crabs): A Really good comedy family entertainer, with some of the same cast as Premam..

    Da Thadiya ( Hai Fatty): A Comedy entertainer with a message. Nivin plays the negative character in an extended cameo. I Liked it

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  7. Pingback: Friday Classics: Queen, The Original Will Always Be the Best | dontcallitbollywood

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