Well, this is a fun song! And an extremely blatantly “we aren’t even trying” historically inaccurate song. Yaaaay! I love when movies stop trying and tell us they aren’t trying! Way better than pretending to be trying but not really.
Oh, and also, Varun and Aditya are friends! In a kind of awkward “we don’t usually hang out together in this neighborhood” way. I like the little glances they keep exchanging of “are you having fun? I’m having fun”.
Plot guesses, they could be childhood friends rediscovering each other as adults. They could be friends in a different context (like, Varun is Aditya’s blacksmith and they hang out together at the stables or something). Or they could be brand new friends, just shared some experience together and now are going out to celebrate. I’m assuming this is Varun’s area since it is the Muslim area and Aditya, upper class respectable Hindu, is enjoying dancing with the fun lower class bar dancer type.
What do you think?
dontcallitbollywood 
Maybe it’s a Dola Re Dola situation where the movie is like let’s randomly get these two characters together. I honest to god have no idea what’s happening but Kriti is fab and I loved all the face she was giving.
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or a Dhol Bhaje situation, that song in HDDCS that Ajay and Salman sung together without knowing their connection. Maybe Varun has said good-bye to Alia and then separately randomly befriended Aditya.
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Honestly I actually think this is the only song I liked so far. Was not impressed with the other songs from this movie. Wait salman and Ajay shared a song in HDDCS?? I don’t remember that.
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I think it starts with them together and then fades to Salman and Aish. Ajay runs into Salman in Budapest and they strike up a friendship and have coffee together, commiserating over their respective broken hearts without realizing they are talking about the same woman. Salman offers to teach Ajay to sing and teaches him the Dhol Bhaje song, and then it fades from them singing together to Salman either imagining or remembering dancing to that song with Aish.
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Oh that thing yeah I remember that
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I first saw Kriti in Heropanti but mostly noticed Tiger. There was something so odd about him; the face not classic Indian hero; the acting tentative; a certain pan-sexual yet very male aura. I had no idea then he was Jacky’s little boy. I did the research and, all of a sudden, he was all over the place: best newcomer, dancing with Hrithik, scores of workout vids on YouTube. I couldn’t wait for is next film and nearly wept when it was the terrible (except for Kay Kay’s scenery chewing) Flying Jatt. Baaghi was meh, Munna Michael marginally better. I’m waiting for Baaghi 2. I can’t make up my mind if I’ll stick with him. He’s improved, become more comfortable in front of the camera, and I can see he’s serious and trying hard to be the best he can. But still, there’s that odd…I don’t know what. It’s no contest with Kriti, on the other hand. She just gets better and better. I’m glad she came up through the ranks like SRK and Ranveer and others I don’t yet know. (If you do, please tell.) Can’t knock street cred.
Question: when they say, “Such and such movie starring John Abraham and debutante Blahblahblah” does that mean the actress is really a rich deb, like with a coming out party and all, who asked Daddy to use his connections to get her a lead in a movie? I don’t mind star kids (my darling Harshvardan and Sara AK) but I’d hate it if Indian directors valued the industry so lightly. I’ve seen a couple of these gals introduced in the credits as debutantes who really stunk up the joint. One, Aisha Sharma, however, might turn out to be okay.
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Kriti’s first move 1: Nenokkadine in Telugu opposite Mahesh Babu. She was brilliant in that movie. No OTT acting..
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Baaghi 2 is really dark and actiony. Personally I liked Flying Jatt the best because it was all bright and goofy, but if you liked it least, then Baaghi 2 may be for you. Anyway, I love Kriti too! I saw her in Dilwale first, and found her meh. But then I was kind of impressed with her in 1: Nennokadine, it’s really a hero movie so she doesn’t have much to do but she is fine. And I was really really impressed with her in Bareilly Ki Barfi and almost as impressed with Luka Chuppi. She’s got a spark onscreen that is hard to ignore, plus she seems to have some actual acting ability.
It’s really hard to tell with these “debutante” actresses! Some of them are rich kids, some of them are filmi kids but with less famous relatives, some of them are straight up struggling actors. In Student of the Year 2, for instance, Ananya Panday is the daughter of Chunkey Panday who was never a star or famous or powerful, but has famous and powerful friends (Ananya is good friends with Suhana Khan, for instance, and Chunkey is part of the general SRK/Hrithik group of friends). She is new to the audience, not one of those kids who has been stalked on social media most of her life, but definitely got the chance thanks to her father’s friends. And Tara Sutaria is from a regular family and has been acting since she was a kid, was in a Disney India channel show and stuff like that, she earned this chance. Most people seem like they are kind of in between. Ranveer for example, his family is fairly wealthy, and his mother’s cousin is married to Anil Kapoor. So he is sort of connected, and sort of powerful. And he is also sort-of trained and talented, he has an acting degree from Indian University. He got his big break because YRF’s casting director saw him at a party, which kind of combines all those things, she wouldn’t have gone past the audition if he didn’t have the skills from Indiana, but he wouldn’t have been at that party if he wasn’t rich and with film connections.
Bringing it back to this song, Varun Dhawan is the son of David Dhawan, very successful comedy director. But never founded a studio, was never in gossip magazines, just a working member of the film fraternity with a lot of friends he could call on for favors. Varun did an acting course with David John in Delhi (method trained actor who landed in Delhi in the 70s, Shahrukh was one of his early students, now he has a whole acting school), then two years working as an assistant director for Karan, before getting cast in Student of the Year after showing Karan his audition reel. Aditya Roy Kapoor is third generation film, his grandfather was a minor producer, his mother was an item girl and his Dad another producer. His older brother was head of UTV/Disney India for a while, now is running his own studio. Aditya did the acting training course with David John too I think, then auditioned and was cast in Aashiqui 2, low budget Bhatt films romance that ended up being a sleeper hit. He hasn’t worked regularly over the last few years and seems to have slipped down into second lead roles. And Kriti came from an average middle-class family, started working as a model in college (“model” meaning doing TV ads, so more like an actress), then got cast in the heroine part in 1:Nenokaddine and followed that up with Heropanti and Dilwale. Movies where they didn’t want a big name who would overshadow the hero, but were still looking for an interesting look.
Oh, you have me all inspired! I think I have to do a 101 on how people get film roles.
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At this point, I don’t really know what to expect from Kalank other than the fact that it will probably have everything you can expect from an Indian movie.
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That is the tagline they should have used for the posters!!!!! “everything you can expect from an Indian movie”.
On Sat, Apr 13, 2019 at 3:31 PM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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Parties (not just ones thrown by the film fraternity) have long been the hunting ground for new talent. It was referenced in the movie Fashion when Priyanka gets to the right parties by being an escort to one of the business types.Just for hanging on to his arm and looking good.And it’s not even a new thing.In the 60s, B.R Chopra found his new heroine for Humraaz, Vimmi at one such party. Vinod Khanna was spotted at a South Bombay party by Sunil Dutt.
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We saw that in Luck By Chance too, now that I think about it, Farhan cashed in a favor and asked for an invite to a release party, then made a point of getting noticed in the hope of it panning out into a role, which it eventually did.
On Sat, Apr 13, 2019 at 11:49 PM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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They use the word debutant to only mean debut or new. It does not refer to wealth or connection the way it might here. Interesting thought about Ranveer at a party. Yes , he wouldn’t be there if he didn’t know the right people, but a nobody could turn up at a party as well.
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Thank you! I am so stuck in my own head, I completely missed the meaning of the question. By the traditional “debutant”, the only one I think that genuinely qualifies is Naveli Nanda (Amitabh’s granddaughter) who was set to be the debutante of debutantes, invited to be part of Le Ball De Debutante in Paris. The Ambani daughters did it too. But that kind of old money and power and all that, those daughters wouldn’t be in a movie, their family has a cleaner brighter plan for them (Naveli’s mother has made it very clear that she will not be acting, although she may take over the family firm).
The thing that interests me with Ranveer at that party is that a nobody could have wandered in too, but it would have to be a nobody who spoke English, wore the right clothes, knew how to act at a house party, and so on and so forth. Nawazuddin wouldn’t have cut it most likely. And probably not Kangana either. Shahrukh would have (and did), Karan Johar would not (and didn’t, it took him a long time to fit in). It’s not exactly a restriction to just the film industry, but it is a restriction to people raised in the kind of community where the film industry lives and parties.
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For what it’s worth, Ananya Pandey actually is a debutant. She debuted at Le Bal in Paris either last year or the year before – the same year as Reese Witherspoon’s daughter. Navya was supposed to the year before but ended up cancelling at the last minute due to terrorist threats in Europe at that time.
Chunky Pandey was a well known actor in the 80s. Perhaps not at the top of the A-list but still a household name in India. He is Colonel Kapoor’s nephew (the one who made Fauji with SRK). He is well connected.
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People were very surprised that Ananya could debut at Le Bal because the family is well connected but pretty much C or D list otherwise in today’s time. I can only assume the importance of these events is declining and they’re trying to venture into new markets that might value them. In earlier times kids of actors would have been looked down on but even so, A-list families would make sense but the Pandeys? Strange.
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I was thinking for days why I dislike this Ananya so much, and now I finally know. It’s because I hate when something is forced on me, and I feel like everybody is trying to convince me I should like and support her. But she is so fake on all those “candid” and official photos. And also on twitter I must read other actors praising her if she wasn’t in any movie!
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I can’t figure out Ananya. I don’t even find her face that interesting.
On Sun, Apr 14, 2019 at 8:53 AM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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Exactly!
I can be wrong, maybe she is talented, who knows? But for now it looks like some talentless spoiled girl decided she wants to be an actress, and we must applaud her for that.
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I’m with you there. Ever since the film industry has opened up to girls from film families, ALL of them want to be actresses. Next up is Shanaya Kapoor, also part of the same group of friends.
What irks me most is that most of them don’t even prepare for it! They have no training, never acted in one play in school, don’t go to acting school, etc. They just use their connections and get launched and spend all their money on hiring stylists and PR agencies.
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Let me direct you to my most recent Hindi Film 101 post!
What I find really interesting is that it seems like the famous actresses have less training than the actors. Varun did a course from David John, and worked for Karan for two years, plus had extensive dance training, before he tried for a launch. No matter how you feel about him, at least he put in the time and the work before even auditioning. Tiger spent a crazy amount of time on dance and fight training. I don’t think it is fair all around, they ruin a series of movies and then their careers never take off, versus if they weren’t offered the opportunities until they’d put in the work, just like the male star kids, the movies would have been better and their lives would be better too in every way. Sara’s parents were very smart to keep her in school and training until she was 24, even if she could have started working much earlier, because she is going to benefit so much from that extra time. With the actresses, it feels like the thinking is all they need is a pretty face and a famous name and that is good enough, no one expects that much from them anyway.
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YES! I think the same! They don’t learn acting, don’t dance, don’t even speak hindi well but have heroine/hero roles in their first movies. And they know since they are teenagers that they want be in movies, and nobody force them to study and be a doctor or an engineer. I can’t help but compare those “actresses” to my fav Sai Pallavi who didn’t know she will work in movies, was studying hard to become a doctor and she also had time to dance and is now one of the best dancers. But yes, she didn’t waste time in boutiques and at the parties.
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Excepting Salman’s brother-in-law, it just doesn’t seem that common for the actors though. The male debutants are more likely to have dance and acting training before their launch, it’s the little girls who get thrown on screen before they have done anything. And then their careers fizzle out super fast compared to the actors. Look at Ranbir versus Sonam, launched in the same movie but with very different careers. Ranbir got a lot of “ooo, he has acting training, he is such a good dancer, blah blah blah”. Sonam couldn’t dance or act really, but she was also 19 years old and had never been trained to act or dance, just thrown on camera and told “this is your big break, be pretty”. Sonakshi, same thing. Parineeti too.
I don’t really feel comfortable blaming teenage girls for being shallow and only thinking about their looks and fun stuff instead of working hard. It’s not on them, that’s what all teenage girls are like, it’s on the industry that plays into their self-destructive tendencies. Jiah Khan, Divya Bharti, Anu Agarwal, and so on and so forth, they had too much too soon and it destroyed them. That’s why film families didn’t want their daughters acting until just now. And I am guessing as soon as one of these new film family actresses destructs somehow, no one will let them act again. At least, not unless they are trained and mature and can handle it.
On Sun, Apr 14, 2019 at 3:40 PM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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I don’t have problems blaming those young actresses because they are not babies, they watch movies and can understand what is necessary to be good in this work. Their families are also to blame because they should send the children to some lessons or stuff. Aren’t they ashamed to show how untalented their children are?
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A nobody cannot turn up at any film party, neither in a hotel nor at anyone’s home. The security would make it impossible. Ranveer is a rich kid from Bandra. He has known these people most of his life. For example, he dated Ahana Deol when he was younger (Hema and Dharam’s daughter), he is close friends with Arpita (Salman’s sister) since his school days, had attended parties with Ranbir and Sonam when he was a kid (there are pics available online) and knew YRF directors like Shaad Ali long before his first film.
The ‘outsider’ status he tries to use for publicity is a total cover-up. Those days did not have social media so it was much easier to hide. Today’s kids won’t be able to do that.
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I don’t think it was a film party, it was a Bandra party that had some film people at it. But, same kind of thing. I am sure it was at a hotel or somewhere else that would have a built in screening for class, money, etc.
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The best thing Saif and Amrita did is insist on Sara finishing college. She’s not trained in acting either but at least it gave her time to mature and grow up and see the world outside. If things don’t work out, she likely would not self-destruct, and would be able to dust herself off and go get some other type of job.
These girls like Ananya and Shanaya have nothing to fall back on and their parents are not so big themselves that they can just absorb the kids into a family business in case they fail as actors. What happens then is that they end up having to look for rich men to marry their daughters to as if it’s still the 17th century.
I think they’re afraid of sending them to college or making them train for a few years because then their best aspect, their youth, will be lost. They also aren’t as privileged as kids of the A-list because there is no guarantee that the same film offers will still be available a few years later. They want to grab what they can and not let go of current opportunities because who knows if they will come again later.
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Oh, that is an interesting way to look at it! It’s not that we should be thinking “I can’t believe even Chunkey Panday and Shakti Kapoor’s daughters got a chance”, we should be thinking “only Chunkey Panday and Shakti Kapoor’s daughters would be desperate enough to take this chance like this”. Sara Ali Khan could afford to wait, and so could Suhana Khan. Acting is a choice for them out of many potential options for their lives.
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SRK’s kids don’t have an option but to go study and train because it’s the only thing that will deflect from the nepotism criticism they’re sure to face. At least they can use it to show that they have worked hard. They will be the lightening rod for it in a way no other insiders will be. It will be much better for them to start their careers in the US or UK though it’s likely that Dad will have connections there as well. But it’s easier to avoid the nepotism cries that way because the connections wouldn’t be in such an openly visible way how it would be in India.
Apart from a tiny internet audience, I doubt anyone knows or cares who Ananya’s parents are. She can benefit from connections without facing much flak for it. The negative of course is that the door is not open in an unlimited way. If she gets an offer from Karan Johar now, she has to grab it because there will be many others vying for the same thing. There is no luxury of waiting and being able to turn things down because who knows if offers will still come 4 or 5 years later.
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Thank everybody for the input. And I’m bummed that the hype (lowp?) Ranveer pushes about his humble beginnings isn’t exactly true.
More please, Margaret (and anyone else) about how the old and new crop of stars their chances.
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I just wrote a very very VERY long post looking at all the actors working today. It’s kind of interesting how their backgrounds don’t match with their perceptions. For instance, Ranveer and Radhike and Sonam and Parineeti are the only ones who had an overseas education (the highest sign of class in India). They have such different careers, you wouldn’t think they shared that background. Sushant Singh Rajput got admission to the 5th best engineering school in India (a very VERY big deal) and dropped out to work full time as a dancer before turning to acting. Would not have expected that.
Anyway, look for that post later today sometime.
On Sun, Apr 14, 2019 at 6:40 AM dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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Actually, Kriti Sanon is a trained Kathak dancer (what Madhuri also trained in). She would have pulled off a traditional dance quite well, I think. You can see her classical training in her hand movements and posture. Perhaps they didn’t want to invite comparisons between her and Alia?
It’s clear that Alia worked very hard to perform the choreography in Ghar More, but you can also see some flaws. It’s similar to Deepika’s performance in Bajirao Mastani. Not a bad performance but far from what a trained Kathak dancer can achieve. Someone needs to give Kriti a traditional dance to perform. It would be really interesting to see, given her training.
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It’s really set in la la Land. What are the chances of two men openly dancing alongside a (Muslim?) Nautch girl in pre partition India?
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It’s the Nautch girl part that kills me. Madhuri seems to be playing this very respectable Tawaif, and then Kiara and Kriti are playing the kind of “we dance in the streets with men” version. You can’t have both in the same movie! It’s just odd. I could absolutely believe Aditya taking his friend as a special treat to a private Madhuri performance, but this big group dance thing with Kriti makes no sense.
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Long “waste”? Surely Kriti wouldn’t appreciate that.
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Curse you, homonym! My old nemesis!!!! Oh well, it’s clear what I meant, I won’t bother changing it.
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