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Chocklet!

Saw Chocklet today. Good thing about video is that you can really fast forward - it really helped. I thought Malayalam movies were getting worse for around a year now, but Tamil movies seem to be not far behind. My surprise is that Hindi movies actually seem better these days - I wouldn’t have thought that possible even 2 years ago.

I think they tried to get people in using the intentionally misspelled title. Review below. Spoilage warning - ending mentioned. The photo shown is from the Chocklet site.

Story is the usual one. Super boy of a college meets the super girl of neighboring college. Love at first sight for the boy. They go on a trial relationship for a week, then both are in love. Boy helps in uniting her parents without knowing that she is his best friend’s daughter.

Girl’s friend has an eye on the boy, so cooks up a story that is enough (don’t ask me, I don’t know!) to break the couple up. Surprise, they find a folk dancer who looks just like the cunning friend. Several dances, pizza, burger, junk food, food courts, cell phones, fights, pulsating midriffs and thighs later, all misunderstandings are sorted out. Wait, evil mother who has to get all what she wants now wants a London-based software engineer (ouch, I thought software engineers are no longer eligible grooms in Madras, since the economy went down). Anyway, London guy is cool - speaks with a better Indian accent than Madras kids in the movie.

Super boy gets hits by a truck while driving under influence of drugged milk - courtesy of evil mother - and is killed. His corpse turns alive in the mortuary when it hears the wedding bells for the girl and the London guy. Next moment, back from the dead super boy lands in the wedding hall - off course, with a small hanky around his head to cover his accident wound - kisses the bride. Evil mother tries to con the daughter into marrying the London guy using "sentiments", but finally gets into senses listening to the super boy. Super boy weds super couple, every body -except the audience - is happy.

Cast includes:
- Prashant as super boy. Good performance by his standards.
- Jaya Ray as super girl. Good effort to get into micro mini trowsers and to follow MTV culture. Some acting in between - must be an afterthought. Can’t blame her, it is a movie that just moves in different directions.
- Mumtaz as the cunning friend and the dancer. Lots of oomph. If you are a fan of buttery stomachs and thighs getting tossed around, you are in luck. See her dances or go see a plantain farm in a tornado.
- Suhasini as the evil mother. For once she is not the squeeky goody-two-shoes. Suits her. Naturally, an overdose of overacting too.

The good:
- You can watch this movie even if you are heavily drugged or drunk. Nothing to loose or miss.
- In the first 10 minutes, there is a song, a stunt and some sentiments.
- Some fresh faces.

The bad:
- Songs. I speak Tamil, but I’ve no idea what language these were written in.
- Direction less direction.

The ugly:
- Why do Tamilians get hung up on emulating MTV culture? And a "da" to end evey sentence too. eg:. "Ok da", "Call you at 9 o' clock da". Yuck. Priceless gem is when a hottie says "check it out" as "saeck it ouTT".
- Apparently Madras has run out of thair saadam, vada and other messy stuff. Pizza and burgers are in. Eating masaala dosa with fork and knife is in too (the part where dosa lands in the neighboring table is editted out, I think).
- Abundant supply of comedians. They make you weep, go nuts and get angry. Anything but humourous

Rating: +----. Get some sleep instead.