Cheeni Kum

Thanks to the presence of the oldest angry young man in Bollywood, sixty plus guys have finally received the green signal to go ahead to fall in love and marry women half their age. If not for Amitabh Bachchan, Indians could not have been persuaded to sit and watch such a 'sacrilegious' movie(lol.)

Cheeni Kum has the sixty four year old, sharp-tongued, restaurant owner-chef Bachchan wooing Tabu, a woman half his age. Tabu with her carefree elegance is just the right person to match up to the sarcastic and proud Bachchan. Thankfully Zohra Sehgal is still live(let her continue rocking us with laughter forever and ever) which is good news for Jaya Bachchan otherwise she could have been called to play his mother's role. Let us not forget Paresh Rawal(Tabu's Dad in the film), he has evolved as a comedian so much so that I've forgotten that he used to be the stereotypical bad guy once upon a time.

All could have gone well and we could have gotten a new age Hindi romance if they had not imported the cruel stock villain which guaranteed a flood gate of tears at the box-office in the seventies and eighties - blood cancer. IMHO the overly-'literate', smooth (adult-)talking kid was a needless character. The screenplay is really a long tit for tat affair, quite enjoyable one at that. Direction is also good for a first time - R.Balki. If not for the abnormal proliferation of leukocytes which ruined the movie, it'd have been one of the good modern Bollywood movies of recent times.